LIBRARY 


PURCHASED  FROM 
THE 

WILLIAM  C.  SCHERMERHORN 
MEMORIAL  FUND 


OTHER  WORKS  BY  THE  SAME  AUTHOR 


Cyprian:  The  Churchman 

Erasmus:  The  Scholar 

The  Methodists 

Modernism  and  the  Christian  Faith 

On  the  Value  of  Church  History 

Wesley  as  Sociologist,  Theologian,  Churchman 


CRISES  IN  THE 
EARLY  CHURCH 


I     ■>       i  »      » 

1      J         >       )  '1 


:    Ay 
JOHN  ALFRED  FAULKNER 

Professor  of  H'storics.1  Theology  in  Drev-  Theological  Seminary 


THE  METHODIST  BOOK  CONCERN 

NEW  YORK  CINCINNATI 


Copyright,  1912,  by 
John  Alfred  Faulkner 


a^-i^zKi 


Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 


First  Edition  printed  October,  1912 
Reprinted  October,  1922 


Jo  \ 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.  The  Jewish  Crisis:  or,  Shall  Christianity  be  a 
Sect    op    the    Jews? — The    New    Testament 

Phase 9 

II.  The  Jewish  Crisis — The  Post-Apostolic  Age  ....     23 

III.  The  Gnostic   Crisis:  or,  Shall  Christianity  be 

Transformed     into    a    Theosophic    Cult    or 
Esoteric  "Christian  Science"? 34 

IV.  The   Montanist    Crisis:   or,   Is  Christianity  a 

Progressive  Religion? 52 

V.  The  Monarchian  Crisis:  or.  Who  is  Jesus  Christ?    76 
VI.  The   Chili astic   Crisis:  or.   Shall  Christianity 
Fulfill    its    Mission    by    Leavening    or    by 

Catastrophe? 97 

VII.  The  Arian  Crisis:  or,  Have  We  a  Saviour  as 

Divine  as  He  is  Human? 113 

VIII.  The   Catholic    Change:   or.   Will  Christianity 

Remain  a  Spiritual  Religion? 145 

Appendix  I. — Montanist  Prophecies 156 

Appendix  II. — Literature 160 

Index 165 


3 


THE  HONORED  MEMORY  OP 

MY  THREE  AMERICAN  TEACHERS  IN  CHURCH  HISTORY 

THE  FIRST  TWO  MY  PREDECESSORS  IN  THIS  CHAIR 

Joftn  Jf  letcfier  Jlurdt 

Scholar,  Author,  Traveler,  Bishop 

(George  3Ricfjarb  Ctooli£« 

Scholar,  Ecclesiastical  Refonner,  Theologian 

Egbert  Coffin  ^mptlb 

Scholar,  Theologian,  Sees 


PREFACE 

I  HAVE  been  asked  to  give  a  brief  but  adequate 
discussion  of  the  crises  in  early  Christian  history, 
so  that  they  could  be  understood  by  ministers, 
theological  students,  and  laymen  who  might  be 
interested  in  the  origins  of  their  religion — a  dis- 
cussion founded  on  a  study  of  the  sources  and  of 
modern  scholars.  This  little  book  is  a  modest 
attempt  to  meet  that  request.  For  the  sake  of 
those  who  wish  to  verify  statements  made  in  the 
text  and  to  carry  on  further  studies,  it  has  been 
necessary  to  add  notes ;  but  these  have  been  made 
as  short  as  possible,  and  it  is  hoped  that  they  will 
not  interfere  with  the  pleasure  of  reading  by 
those  who  do  not  care  for  them.  Brief  biblio- 
graphical lists  will  be  found  in  an  appendix.  In 
that  appendix  also  I  have  taken  occasion  to  add 
some  information  on  points  referred  to  in  chap- 
ters I  and  IV,  namely,  on  the  authenticity  of  the 
Great  Commission  and  baptismal  command  (p. 
160)  and  on  that  most  interesting  movement, 
Montanism  (p.  161). 

As  to  the  true  attitude  of  the  student  of  Church 
history  let  the  reader  turn  to  the  paragraph  in- 
troducing the  literature  (p.  159).    If  the  fasci- 

7 


8  Preface 

Dating  study  of  history  is  of  any  value  at  all,  it  is 
to  make  one  esteem  truth  and  fact  more  than  all 
things  else;  indeed,  to  make  one  care  much  for 
truth  but  nothing  for  shibboleths,  whether  the 
so-called  liberal  or  the  so-called  conservative. 


CHAPTER  I 

The  Jewish  Crisis  :  or.  Shall  Christianity  be 

A  Sect  of  the  Jews? — The  New 

Testament  Phase 

We  moderns  can  have  but  little  conception  of 
the  fearful  conflicts  through  which  early  Chris- 
tianity passed,  or  of  how  great  was  the  cost  of 
our  inheritance.  It  is  the  aim  of  this  book  to 
tell  something  about  those  conflicts,  how  they 
arose,  what  was  involved  in  them,  and  how  they 
were  settled.  It  may  be  too  that  indirectly  a 
little  light  may  be  thrown  on  present-day  ques- 
tions. 

First,  then,  the  Jewish  agitation.  What  was 
our  Lord's  attitude  toward  the  law,  the  institu- 
tions and  customs  of  his  people?  Christ  was 
born  a  Jew,  was  circumcised,  educated,  and  in- 
ducted into  all  the  privileges  and  rights  of  a  Jew. 
He,  accordingly,  recognized  cordially  all  the 
nobler  elements  of  his  ancestral  faith.  He  went 
up  to  its  feasts,  he  attended  its  synagogues,  he 
studied  its  sacred  books,  he  revered  its  great  men, 
he  gloried  in  its  history,  and  felt  himself  a  part 
of  that  venerable  tradition  which  went  back  to 
Abraham.  He  stood  squarely  on  the  Old  Testa- 
ment. He  quoted  it  to  decide  questions  in  doc- 
trine and  life;  his  own  religious  consciousness 

9 


10  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

was  formed  in  part  by  sinking  himself  into  the 
books  of  its  prophets  and  psalmists.  He  delib- 
erately shut  off  from  his  gaze  the  literature  and 
civilizations  of  the  Orient  and  of  the  West,  know- 
ing that  for  his  purpose  as  the  Messiah  of  Israel 
and  Eedeemer  of  men  they  had  nothing  to  offer. 
This  did  not  mean  that  he  had  no  sympathy  for 
their  culture,  but  that  for  salvation  the  Jewish 
religion  was  sufficient.  He  would  have  said  that 
so  far  as  the  Greek  or  any  other  religion  or 
civilization  had  truth  he  was  its  author  (John 
1.  9),  and  he  deliberately  extended  the  horizon 
of  God's  kingdom  far  beyond  the  pent-up  Utica 
of  Judaism  (Matt.  8.  11;  compare  Luke  13.  29, 
30).  But  for  the  spiritual  regeneration  of  men, 
which  was  his  task,  the  Jews  were  the  God- 
ordained  instruments  (John  4.  22).  That  any 
essential  element  in  the  Jewish  faith  or  worship 
as  revealed  in  the  Old  Testament  should  pass 
away  as  a  frivolous  or  vain  thing  would  have 
seemed  to  him  preposterous.  Not  a  jot  must 
fail.  All  must  be  taken  up  and  fulfilled  in  its 
highest  and  permanent  meaning  by  him  (Matt. 
5.  17,  18). 

On  the  other  hand,  Christ  recognized  that 
Judaism  itself  was  intended  to  be  a  universal, 
eternal  religion  in  all  those  things  worthy  of 
such  destination,  and  that  he  was  to  be  the  in- 
strument of  it.  The  vision  of  the  Old  Testament 
prophets   went    far   beyond   local    or   temporal 


The  Jewish  Crisis  11 

boundaries.  Their  spiritual  messages  were  for 
all  mankind.  In  other  words,  there  was  a  vast 
Christian  element  in  the  Old  Testament,  an  ele- 
ment that  had  been  covered  up  by  a  multitude  of 
extra-biblical  and  post-biblical  ideas  and  customs 
and  commandments.  To  sweep  away  these  latter, 
to  break  their  intolerable  yoke,  and  to  fasten  the 
gaze  of  Israel  on  its  great  spiritual  treasure — 
that  was  one  of  the  aims  of  Jesus.  Therefore  he 
quoted  the  liberating  messages  of  the  prophets, 
and  felt  that  his  mission  was  to  carry  out  their 
ideas  (Luke  4.  17-19;  Matt.  9.  13,  etc.).  The 
spiritual  nature  and  universal  destination  of 
Judaism  as  summed  up  and  flowered  out  in  Chris- 
tianity, therefore,  was  something  not  brought  in 
from  without,  but  was  a  part  of  the  inmost  con- 
sciousness of  Jesus  steeped  in  the  study  of  the 
prophets  and  wise  men. 

It  was  therefore  no  afterthought  on  Jesus's 
part,  no  daring  program,  no  break  with  the  spir- 
itual ideas  of  Judaism,  when  he  gave  the  great 
commission,  "Go  and  make  disciples  of  all,"  etc. 
(Matt.  28.  19) ;  nor  need  that  commission  be  a 
stumbling-block  to  critics.  Even  Moffatt  is  swept 
off  his  feet  here  by  the  winds  from  Germany.  He 
says^:  (1)  That  the  conception  of  Jesus  as  the 
source  of  authoritative  rules  and  regulations  for 
the  Church  is  not  primitive.  How  late  is  it,  then? 
The  disciples  feel  the  force  of  his  authority  in 

1  HistoriccU  New  Testament,  1901,  pp.  647-649. 


12  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

Acts  1.  4,  6.  But  Christ  gave  no  "authoritative 
rules  and  regulations.''  He  spoke  not  as  the 
scribes,  not  as  a  lawyer,  but  as  a  prophet,  and 
the  great  commission,  the  Lord's  Supper,  and 
baptism  were  not  given  as  "rules  and  regula- 
tions," but,  rather,  as  spiritual  principles  and  in- 
stitutions. (2)  The  idea  of  Christ's  spiritual 
presence  (Matt.  28.  20)  can  also  hardly  be  primi- 
tive. But  it  is  already  spoken  in  Matt.  18.  20  and 
is  involved  in  11.  28,  29 ;  see  also  18.  5.  The  idea 
is  at  the  background  of  much  of  Christ's  teach- 
ing. (3)  The  universal  mission  of  Matt.  28.  19, 
20  could  not  have  been  known  to  the  disciples, 
for  they  "lived  for  years  in  flagrant  disobedience 
to  their  Master's  solemn  command."  Did  they? 
The  command  was  to  begin  at  Jerusalem  (Luke 
24.  47)  and  thence  go  forth.  This  they  did. 
Peter  went  on  missions  outside  of  Jerusalem, 
receiving  the  Samaritans  and  Roman  proselytes 
at  Csesarea  and  finally  up  to  Antioch  and  on  to 
Rome.  James,  the  son  of  Zebedee,  did  not  live 
long  enough  to  carry  out  the  commission,  and 
his  namesake  James,  the  brother  of  the  Lord,  had 
his  duties  in  the  home  city.  John  was  finally 
not  disobedient  to  the  commission,  though  his 
youth  may  have  excused  him  from  too  early  bat- 
tling with  the  troubled  sea.  Nor  is  it  fair  to 
say  that  till  Providence  had  thrust  them  out  on 
the  Gentile  mission  they  could  not  rightly  feel 
that  it  was  being  carried  out  for  them  by  an- 


The  Jewish  Crisis  13 

other,  as  by  Paul.  Nor  was  their  recognition  of 
him  "reluctant/'  but  cordial  and  effective  (Acts 
15.  25,  26).  We  must  remember  also  that  the 
great  commission  meant  Jew  as  well  as  Gentile. 
"All  the  world"  includes  Jerusalem  and  the  Dis- 
persion as  well  as  Rome.  They  could  not  be 
blamed  for  feeling  that  one  way  not  to  carry  out 
Jesus's  wish  was  to  refuse  to  preach  the  gospel 
in  their  native  land.  (4)  Moffatt  objects  also  to 
the  "incipient  Trinitarianism"  of  Matt.  28.  19  as 
too  early,  but  he  acknowledges  that  "every  Jew 
had  an  idea  of  the  Spirit,"  and  as  there  is  no  ob- 
jection to  the  Father,  the  only  difficulty  is  the 
second  member,  whose  absolute  deity  is  already 
expressed  in  16. 16.  The  Trinitarianism  of  Matt. 
28.  19  is  only  a  brief  formula  of  what  is  implicit 
and  explicit  throughout  the  whole  gospel,  and  it 
would  have  caused  no  surprise  in  the  earliest 
Church,  in  whose  consciousness  it  floated  full  and 
clear  (Acts  2.  33,  36).  (5)  The  only  real  stum- 
bling-block is  the  fact  that  baptism  is  always 
given  in  the  name  of  Christ  in  the  New  Testament, 
not  in  the  name  of  the  Trinity.  It  is  not  a  reply 
to  this  to  say  that  in  all  such  passages  all  that  is 
intended  is  to  express  the  idea  that  the  baptized 
embraced  Christianity,  without  implying  any- 
thing as  to  the  formula  used  in  their  baptism. 
The  uniform  use  of  a  part  of  a  formula  "in  the 
name  of  seems  to  show  that  the  passage  intended 
something  more  explicit  than  that.    There  is  not 


14   '        Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

the  least  doubt  that  the  baptisms  in  the  Acts 
were  in  the  name  of  Jesus  only,  but  that  does 
not  necessarily  mean  that  Jesus  never  spoke 
Matt.  28.  19.  To  show  that  it  does  mean  that, 
we  would  have  to  prove  (1)  that  baptism  in  the 
name  of  Christ  did  not  mediate  God  and  send 
the  Holy  Spirit,  and  (2)  that  in  Matt.  28.  19 
Christ  was  giving  a  form  of  words  to  be  actu- 
ally used  in  every  case  of  baptism,  and  not, 
rather,  stating  a  great  religious  principle  in  ref- 
erence to  which  all  baptisms  should  be  per- 
formed.^ 

As  we  enter  the  Acts  we  find  exactly  what  we 
should  expect  from  the  preceding  history,  name- 
ly, a  special  activity  among  the  Jews  of  Jeru- 
salem and  Palestine,  but  with  glimpses  of  a 
larger  field  and  efforts  to  cultivate  it.  In  the 
first  ingathering  it  was  said,  ^^The  promise  is 
unto  you,  and  to  your  children,  and  to  all  that 
are  afar  off"  (Acts  2.  39),  which  almost  seems 
an  echo  of  the  great  commission.  The  gospel 
was  equally  for  the  Jews  at  home  and  the  Gen- 
tiles abroad,  and  therefore  the  apostles  and  first 
Christians  did  not  at  all  feel  that  they  must  come 
out  from  Judaism.  They  continued  steadfastly 
in  the  temple  (2.  46) ,  whither  they  went  up  at  the 
hour  of  prayer  (3.  1),  preached  in  Solomon's 
Porch    (3.  11,  12),  and  interpreted  their  new 

1  See  further  my  remarks  in  Methodist  Review  (New  York),  January, 
1910,  pp.  14-16. 


The  Jewish  Crisis  15 

found  joy  and  life  as  the  sincere  and  cordial  chil- 
dren of  Abraham,  just  as  Wesley  did  his  epoch- 
making  experience  of  1738  in  his  relation  to  the 
Church  of  England. 

But  in  both  cases  the  experiences  went  deeper 
than  they  knew,   and  had  implications  wider 
than  they  dreamed.    A  crystallized  and  conven- 
tionalized ecclesiasticism  cannot  well  adapt  itself 
to  new  life,  much  less  the  degenerate  Judaism  of 
the  first  century.    The  miracle  of  the  healing  of 
the  lame  man,  with  the  speech  of  Peter  that  fol- 
lowed  it,  led  to  persecution  from  the  Sadducean 
officials,  a  persecution  which  broke  out  into  mo- 
mentary frenzy  under  the  strong  and  brilliant 
speech  of  Stephen,  the  Hellenist,  who  promised 
to  be  the  greatest  man  in  the  early  Church.     (A 
Hellenist  was  simply  a  Greek-speaking  Jew.) 
There  was  nothing  in  the  address  of  Stephen  to 
call  out  the  Jewish  wrath,  if  the  murderers  had 
been  open  to  the  appeal  of  Old  Testament  history 
and  had  any  heart  for  its  lessons.    The  Stephen 
tragedy  is  an  illustration  of  how  the  recognized 
guardians  of  religion  may  become  so  warped, 
hardened,  and  skeptical  that  they  do  defiance  to 
the  fundamental  things  they  profess  to  believe, 
and  think  they  are  doing  God  service  in  their 
crimes— of  all  of  which  Church  history  furnishes 
many  examples. 

Farther    afield    go    the    apostles    and    other 
workers,  in  the  spirit  at  least  of  Matt.  28.  19,  if 


16  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

not  according  to  the  letter.  Philip  breaks  the 
way  into  Samaria,  and  Peter  and  John  receive 
the  converts  into  the  Church  on  exactly  the  same 
basis  as  the  Hebrew  Christians  (Acts  8.  5, 14ff.). 
The  God-fearer  (aef^ofievog,  a  heathen  who  wor- 
shiped the  God  of  the  Jews)  of  Candace's  court 
in  far-away  Ethiopia  receives  the  faith  and  is 
sent  on  his  way  rejoicing,  and  Peter  admits  the 
Roman  God-fearer  Cornelius  into  all  the  privi- 
leges of  Christianity  without  circumcision  (see 
chapter  10).  In  connection  with  his  reception 
the  regular  Jewish  Christians  ("the  circumcision 
that  believed")  were  amazed  at  the  indifference 
of  the  Spirit  to  their  prerogatives,  fairly  due  them 
as  standing  in  an  ancient  historical  succession, 
and  looked  with  wonder  at  his  marvelous  gifts 
bestowed  without  hesitation  on  Gentiles  ( 10.  45, 
46).  Soon  unknown  workers  from  Cyprus  and 
Cyrene  introduced  the  gospel  into  the  important 
city  of  Antioch  (Syria),  made  special  appeal  to 
the  Greek-speaking  Jews  or  to  the  Gentiles  (the 
MSS.  are  hopelessly  divided  between  'E^XT^vtardg 
and  "EXXriveg,  and  we  shall  probably  never  know 
which  is  right),  who  responded  with  alacrity  (11. 
20,  21).  Then  Barnabas  was  sent  down  by  the 
Jerusalem  brethren,  who  greeted  the  new  for- 
eign Church  with  joy,  confirmed  them  in  the 
faith,  went  on  to  Tarsus  to  hunt  up  Paul,  and 
with  him  returned  and  labored  for  some  time  in 
that  Asiatic  Greek  city. 


The  Jewish  Crisis  17 

We  now  come  to  an  event  which  precipitated 
the  Jewish  crisis.  Paul  and  Barnabas  take  up 
what  is  called  the  first  missionary  journey  (A. 
D.  47),  and  when  they  reach  Antioch,  in  Pisidia, 
they  preach  with  some  success  and  much  popular 
interest.  But  finally  the  Jews  set  themselves 
strongly  against  the  evangelists,  and  this  opposi- 
tion Paul  interpreted  as  a  providential  hint  to 
try  other  doors.  "It  is  necessary,"  he  said,  "that 
the  word  of  God  should  first  be  spoken  to  Jews; 
but  since  ye  thrust  it  from  you,  lo,  we  turn  to  the 
[pagan]  Greeks  [Gentiles],  for  so  hath  the  Lord 
commanded  us  [Isa.  49.  6  being  the  passage 
the  apostle  had  in  mind].  Then  the  Gentiles 
were  glad  when  they  heard  this,  and  many  be- 
lieved, that  is,  as  many  as  were  disposed  or  set 
[Teray[/,£vog^  by  whom  it  is  not  said]  to  eternal  life 
believed''  (13.  46,  48) .  The  apostles  followed  the 
same  course  in  Iconium,  and  once  more  received 
pagans  into  the  church  (14.  1).  After  various 
sufferings  they  reach  the  Greek  church  of  An- 
tioch in  Syria,  and  tell  them  of  what  has  hap- 
pened, especially  of  the  conversion  of  the  Gentiles 
(verse  27). 

Unfortunately  some  of  the  converts  from 
the  Pharisees  in  Jerusalem  had  so  far  for- 
gotten their  Isaiah  and  the  deeper  trend  of 
Judaism  and  Christianity  as  to  hold,  not  that 
the  Gentile  mission  was  unauthorized,  but  that 
it   must   not   receive   converts    except   through 


18  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

Mosaism  ("needful  to  circumcise  them,  and 
to  charge  them  to  keep  the  law  of  Moses," 
15.  5).  In  a  council  held  in  Jerusalem — the 
first  ever  summoned — this  whole  question  was 
threshed  out  ( chapter  15 ) .  We  need  not  be  sur- 
prised that  in  the  first  set  speech  delivered  to  the 
council  Peter  took  a  line  in  the  true  spirit  of 
Matt.  28.  19.  Paul  and  Barnabas  then  gave  a 
history  of  their  work  among  the  Gentiles,  and 
James,  uterine  brother  of  Jesus,  who  held  the 
chief  place  of  honor  and  influence  in  the  home 
church,  closed  the  discussion  on  the  same  side 
with  Peter  and  Paul,  urging,  however,  for  ex- 
pediency's sake  to  prevent  scandalizing  devout 
Jews,  that  these  Gentile  converts,  while  free  from 
the  Mosaic  law,  should  abstain  from  the  sacri- 
ficial meals  of  pagans  with  their  frequent  im- 
morality, from  blood,  and  from  things  strangled 
(verses  20-29;  16.  4).  This  decree  referred  only 
to  Antioch,  Syria,  and  Cilicia  (15.  23),  and  there- 
fore in  places  outside  of  that  region  Paul  and 
the  other  workers  felt  themselves  under  no  obli- 
gation to  introduce  it.  Thus  was  the  first  phase 
of  the  Jewish  crisis  passed. 

"Advanced''  critics  shy  at  the  fourfold  recom- 
mendations of  this  council  to  the  Gentiles  (things 
sacrificed  to  idols,  blood,  etc.,  verses  20,  29 ) ,  and 
the  younger  Seeberg  is  so  courteous  as  to  say  that 
those  who  assert  the  historicalness  of  Luke's  ac- 
count have  either  not  considered  the  subject  or 


The  Jewish  Crisis  19 

are  impervious  to  evidence.^    But  even  the  great 
rationalist  Pfleiderer  admits^  that  the  prohibi- 
tions fit  well  into  the  historical  situation  ("Such 
heathen  customs  or  immoralities  as  were  espe- 
cially offensive  to  the  Jew  on  account  of  his  habit 
as  to  legal  or  moral  cleanness,  and  therefore  the 
intermission  of  these  things  on  the  part  of  the 
heathen  Christians  as  a  condition  of  brotherly 
intercourse,   especially  of  table  communion   in 
mixed  societies  or  churches,  seemed  necessary") 
much  better  then  than  a  half  century  later.    Still 
Pfleiderer  does  not  believe  the  account  historical, 
for  the  following  reasons:  (1)  In  Paul's  account 
of  his  visit  to  Jerusalem  in  Gal.  2.  10  he  says 
that  the  only  condition  of  the  free  carrying  out 
of  his  Gentile  apostleship  mentioned  by  the  Jeru- 
salem apostles  was  the  remembering  the  poor. 
But  it  is  by  no  means  certain  that  the  visit  to 
Jerusalem  of  Gal.  2  is  the  same  as  that  of  Acts 
15.    It  may  be  either  the  contribution  or  benevo- 
lence visit  of  Acts  11.  30 ;  12.  25,  or  a  flying  in- 
termediate one  not  mentioned  in  the  Acts.     If 
the  reader  will  turn  to  Professor  Vernon  Bart- 
let's  discussion^  he  will  find  that  the  ordinary 
supposition  of  critics  that  the  visits  of  Gal.  2 
and  Acts  15  are  the  same  is  by  no  means  neces- 
sary.   But  only  on  that  supposition  are  their  ob- 

1  Theologisches  Literatur-Blatt,  1907,  col.  17. 

2  Das  Urchristentum,  2  Aufl.  1902,  vol.  i,  p.  507, 
»  Apostolic  Age,  1900,  pp.  53-6?. 


20    ■  '      Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

jections  valid.  (2)  In  Antioch,  in  the  strife  with 
Peter,  where  the  question  w^as  a  related  one,  that 
of  table  communion  between  Gentile  and  Jewish 
Christians,  Paul  makes  no  mention  of  the  decree 
of  Acts  15.  29.  But  if  the  rebuke  was  later  than 
the  decree,  one  can  readily  understand  that  Paul 
might  prefer  to  convince  Peter  of  his  mistaken 
step,  both  as  a  matter  of  courtesy  and  of  effective- 
ness, on  general  religious  principles  rather  than 
by  simply  pointing  to  the  decree.  (3)  In  his 
treatment  of  eating  flesh  offered  to  idols  in  1  Cor. 
8  and  10  Paul  judges  of  the  matter  in  a  spirit  more 
liberal  than  Acts  15.  29,  referring  it  to  each  man's 
conscience,  and  apparently  knowing  nothing  of 
the  decree.  But  the  decree  was  especially  limited 
to  Syria  and  adjacent  regions  (15.  23),  not  far 
from  the  sensitive  atmosphere  of  Palestine;  in 
points  more  remote,  especially  in  Europe,  Paul 
felt  himself  perfectly  justified  in  looking  at  the 
matter  from  a  larger  point  of  view.  (4)  In  21. 
25  James  mentions  the  decree  to  Paul  in  a  way 
which  suggests  that  Paul  never  heard  of  it  before. 
Is  that  so?  Quite  the  contrary,  it  seems  to  me. 
Would  such  an  important  decree  be  referred  to  so 
casually,  without  any  introduction  or  explana- 
tion, if  it  were  unknown  to  Paul?  So  much  for 
the  objections.  I  cannot  see  that  they  overthrow 
the  essential  accuracy  of  Luke  in  Acts  15. 

The  rest  of  the  New  Testament  need  not  detain 
us  long.    It  had  now  been  determined  that  Chris- 


The  Jewish  Crisis  21 

tianity  should  go  its  way  among  the  Gentiles 
without  being  hampered  by  the  ceremonial  or 
national  laws  of  Judaism,  and  that  even  for  the 
pious  Gentiles  among  the  Jews  Mosaism  had 
passed.  As  I  have  said,  this  was  no  breach  with 
Judaism  as  its  noblest  representatives  viewed  it, 
but  was,  rather,  in  the  line  of  the  prophets,  of 
John  the  Baptist  and  of  Christ.  There  were  now 
Jewish  Christian  churches  and  Gentile  churches, 
but  between  the  two  there  was  no  conflict  as  to 
the  heart  of  Christianity,  namely,  that  salvation 
came  through  faith  in  Christ,  Messiah,  Re- 
deemer, and  Lord.  Both  held  to  the  sacraments, 
both  built  on  the  Old  Testament,  both  accepted 
as  from  God  the  great  leaders  of  each.  The  Gen- 
tile church  did  not  seek  to  force  its  ideas  on  the 
Jewish,  or  refuse  fellowship  with  the  circumcised, 
nor  did  the  latter  deny  the  Christian  standing  of 
the  former.  Of  course  it  was  inevitable  that  with 
the  growth  of  the  Church  in  the  Roman  world, 
with  the  increasing  animosity  of  the  Jews  to  the 
spreading  "sect,"  ending  in  the  final  and  total 
separation  from  the  Christians  after  70,  and  espe- 
cially with  the  working  of  the  leaven  of  the  great 
principle  accepted  at  the  bottom  by  all — that 
men  are  justified  not  by  works  but  by  faith  in 
Christ — it  was  inevitable,  I  say,  that  Jewish 
churches  as  such  should  entirely  disappear.  It 
was  in  the  historical  evolution  that  James  the 
Just  should  decrease  and  Paul  increase. 


22  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

But  this  result  was  not  yet.  The  extreme  Jewish 
Christian  party,  which  wanted  everybody  to  come 
into  Christianity  through  the  Mosaic  law,  was 
not  dead,  and  members  of  it  made  many  bitter 
moments  for  Paul.  In  the  Epistle  to  the  Gala- 
tians  especially  the  apostle  gives  them  a  Roland 
for  an  Oliver  in  fine  style,  vindicating  forever 
the  absolute  freedom  of  the  Gentiles  from  the 
Jewish  law.  Fearing  their  work  also  among  the 
Romans,  in  whose  society  there  were  many  Jew- 
ish believers,  he  makes  the  same  plea  in  his 
epistle  to  them.  But  that  does  not  mean  that 
Paul  had  grown  less  catholic  toward  his  own 
faith,  for  he  never  interfered  with  the  Jewish 
part  of  the  Church,  being  as  loyal  as  they  wished 
to  the  law,  and  himself  at  times  assumed  vows 
and  made  offerings  at  the  temple  (Acts  18.  18; 
21.  23-26) .  And  he  ever  retained  a  true  patriot's 
pride  in  belonging  to  the  greatest  race  and  re- 
ligion known  in  the  history  of  the  world  (Rom. 
9.  3-5),  but  it  is  one  of  the  ironies  of  history  that 
it  was  left  to  the  chief  man  in  that  race  to  carry 
out  the  program  of  Christ,  and  emancipate  his 
religion  from  the  limitations  of  its  birth  and  en- 
vironment. 


CHAPTER  II 

The  Jewish  Crisis— The  Post- Apostolic  Age 

The  fearful  destruction  of  Jerusalem  by  the 
armies  of  Titus  in  A.  D.  70  broke  the  spell  which 
in  an  external  way  bound  the  Jewish  Christians 
to  Judaism.     This  was  helped  along  by  the  re- 
bellion under  Bar-Kochba  (A.  D.  132-135),  when 
the  celebrated  rabbi  Akiba  was  acknowledged  as 
Messiah.     The  name  of  Jerusalem  was  changed 
to   Aelia   Capitolina,   heathen   institutions   and 
temples  were  introduced  into  it,  Jews  were  for- 
bidden to  enter  it  (a  law  which  was  kept  up  for 
nearly  two  hundred  years),  and  circumcision, 
observance  of  the  Sabbath,  and  instruction  in  the 
law  were  prohibited.     Strict  watch  was  to  be 
kept  over  all  the  important  religious  transactions 
of  the  Jews.    Under  this  pressure  Rabbi  Akiba 
gathered  an  assembly  of  scribes  and  other  learned 
men  at  Lydda,  who  passed  a  resolution  to  allow 
the  people  to  overstep  the  law,  except  in  idolatry, 
incest,  and  murder.     In  the  reaction  caused  by 
this  pagan  persecution  Judaism  became  hardened 
and  self-centered,  and  under  national  and  re- 
ligious hate  separated  itself  from  anything  like 
the  free  Greek  culture  embodied,  for  instance, 
by  Philo.    "Judaism  became  again  Hebrew  and 

fully  Pharisaic— the  religion  of  idolatry  of  the 

2a 


24  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

letter;  the  Mosaic  law  ended  in  the  Talmud  and 
prophetism  in  the  mythical  number-play  of  the 
Cabbala.''^  Of  course  the  Christians  did  not  join 
in  the  rebellion  of  Bar-Kochba,  for  which  refusal 
they  were  persecuted  by  the  Jews.  The  Chris- 
tians were  looked  upon  as  apostates,  and  a  spe- 
cial form  of  curse  was  devised  for  them  which 
was  pronounced  against  them  three  times  every 
Sabbath.  To  the  distinguished  rabbi  Tarphan 
was  ascribed  the  saying  that  a  persecuted  man 
might  rather  flee  into  an  idol  temple  than  into 
the  houses  of  the  Minim  (Christians),  because 
an  idolater  denies  God,  whom  he  knows  not,  while 
the  Minim  deny  the  known  truth.  Their  books 
also  should  be  burned,  even  though  the  name  of 
God  does  occur  in  them.  The  Jews  began  to 
circulate  calumniations  against  the  Christians, 
and  were  the  first,  says  Eusebius,^  to  carry  wood 
to  the  stake  where  the  latter  were  to  be  burned 
for  their  faith. 

Before  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem  the  Jewish 
Christians  retired  to  Pella,  on  the  other  side  of 
the  Jordan  (compare  Matt.  24.  15,  16).  Some 
of  them  remained  there.  Others  returned  to  the 
Holy  Land,  and  even  to  Jerusalem.  There 
James,  the  brother  of  Jesus,  had  already  been 
slain  by  the  Jews,  whom  he  had  striven  so  ear- 
nestly to  conciliate  by  living  as  a  devout  Jew- 

» MoUer-von  Schubert,  KG.,  1902,  vol.  I,  p.  103. 
»  Historia  Ecclesiastica,  4. 15,  29. 


The  Jewish  Crisis  25 

Christian — slain,  according  to  Josephus/  by 
stoning  by  the  Sanhedrin,  according  to  Hege- 
sippus  (in  Eusebius,  2.  23,  12ff.)>  a  Christian 
historian  of  the  second  century,  by  being  thrown 
from  the  pinnacle  of  the  temple  and  later  dis- 
patched by  a  blow  from  a  fuller's  club  when  pray- 
ing for  his  enemies  (A.  D.  62).  After  him  other 
relatives  of  Jesus  had  a  leading  part  in  governing 
the  Jerusalem  church.  There  Simeon  the  son  of 
Clophas,  a  cousin  of  Christ,  stood  till  his  martyr 
death  under  Trajan,  and  a  later  tradition  even 
made  him  set  in  by  the  apostles  themselves  as  the 
head  of  that  society  (3.  11).  Also  the  grandsons 
of  Jude,  the  brother  of  Jesus,  were  leaders  (3. 
20,  8),  of  whom  the  touching  story  is  told  by 
Hegesippus  that  they  were  brought  before  the 
Emperor  Domitian  (A.  D.  81-96)  as  being  de- 
scendants of  David,  were  interrogated  by  him 
as  to  their  possessions  and  as  to  the  nature  of 
the  kingdom  of  the  Messiah,  and  replied  that 
their  property  was  only  thirty-nine  acres,  that 
the  kingdom  was  a  purely  spiritual  one,  and  that 
the  Christ  was  to  come  at  the  end  of  the  world  to 
judge  the  living  and  the  dead.  They  then  showed 
their  calloused  hands  as  an  evidence  of  their 
peasant  origin  and  poverty,  and  were  dismissed 
without  being  molested. 

The  two  kinds  of  Jewish  Christians  shown 
by  our   New   Testament  sources   continued  on 

»  Antiquities,  20.  9,  1, 


26  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

in  post-apostolic  times — the  strict  party,  who 
wanted  every  one  initiated  into  Judaism,  and  the 
liberals,  who  did  not  insist  on  this  for  the  Gen- 
tiles. In  Justin  Martyr's  Dialogue  with  Trypho, 
chapters  46,  47,  written  perhaps  in  A.  D.  140-150, 
he  discusses  matters  in  this  field.  Trypho  asks 
if  a  believer  in  Christ  who  wishes  to  live  still  as  a 
strict  Jew  can  be  saved.  Justin  answers  that 
( 1 )  it  is  absolutely  impossible  now  to  observe  all 
the  laws  of  Moses,  and  (2)  that  there  were  some 
laws  imposed  for  the  hardness  of  the  people's 
hearts,  which  laws  now  contribute  nothing  to  the 
performance  of  righteousness  and  piety.  Trypho 
then  presses  his  question  whether  a  Christian 
man  who  acknowledges  all  this  and  yet  wishes 
to  observe  the  institutions  of  the  Jews  can  be 
saved.  To  this  Justin  replies :  "Such  an  one  will 
be  saved  if  he  does  not  strive  in  every  way  to 
persuade  other  men — I  mean  those  Gentiles  who 
have  been  circumcised  from  error  by  Christ — to 
observe  the  same  things  as  himself,  telling  them 
that  they  will  not  be  saved  unless  they  do  so." 
Justin  goes  on  to  say  that  there  are  persons  who 
take  that  narrow  view,  but  there  are  others  who 
wish  for  themselves  "to  observe  the  institutions 
given  by  Moses,"  but  do  not  insist  that  other 
Christians  should  be  circumcised,  keep  the  Sab- 
bath, or  "observe  other  such  ceremonies";  with 
these,  says  Justin,  we  ought  to  join  ourselves 
and  hold  them  as  kinsmen  and  brothers.    As  to 


The  Jewish  Crisis  27 

the  strict  party  he  does  not  definitely  pronounce 
whether  they  will  be  saved  or  not,  though  he 
acknowledges  that  those  w^hom  they  have  per- 
suaded to  take  up  Mosaism  along  with  "their 
confession  of  God  in  Christ'^  shall  probably  be 
saved.  Those,  however,  who  have  given  up  their 
Christian  confession  for  Judaism,  and  "have  re- 
pented not  before  death,''  shall  not  be  saved, 
much  less  regular  Jews  and  especially  those  Jews 
who  anathematize  Christ  in  the  synagogues — • 
certainly  an  instructive  and  striking  judgment. 

The  discrimination  of  Justin  is  hardly  illus- 
trated in  his  earlier  contemporary  Ignatius 
(110-117),  who  roundly  rejects  any  Judaizing. 
"Be  not  seduced,"  he  cries  out,  "by  strange  doc- 
trines nor  by  old  profitless  fables.  For  if  even 
unto  this  day  we  live  after  the  manner  of  Juda- 
ism, we  own  that  we  have  not  received  grace;  for 
the  divine  prophets  [that  is.  Christian  prophets] 
lived  after  [in  accordance  with,  icard]  Christ." 
Ingnatius  then  points  to  a  break  with  Judaism : 
Those  w  ho  "had  walked  in  ancient  practices  have 
attained  unto  newness  of  hope,  no  longer  observ- 
ing Sabbaths,  but  living  according  to  the  Lord's 
[day]."  Put  away  then  the  vile  leaven  which  is 
sour,  and  betake  yourselves  to  the  new  leaven 
which  is  Christ.  For  "it  is  monstrous  to  speak 
Jesus  Christ  and  practice  Judaism,  for  Chris- 
tianity did  not  believe  on  Judaism,  but  Judaism 
on   Christianity,  which  every  tongue  believing 


28  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

was  gathered  unto  God."^  Also  in  his  epistle  to 
the  Philadelphians  (§  6)  he  shows  little  patience 
with  Judaism.  "If  any  interpret  to  you  Juda- 
ism, hearken  not  to  him,  for  it  is  better  to  hear 
Christianity  from  a  circumcised  man  than  Juda- 
ism from  an  uncircumcised/'  Farther  on  he 
speaks  of  them  who  say,  "If  I  do  not  find  it  in  the 
archives  [dpx^toi^,  probably  the  Old  Testament], 
I  do  not  believe  in  the  gospel."  To  them  Ignatius 
answers,  "It  is  written'';  that  is,  it  is  really  in 
the  Old  Testament.  They  reply,  "That  is  the 
question.'^  But  Ignatius  bursts  out :  "But  to  me 
Jesus  Christ  is  archives.  His  cross  and  death 
and  his  resurrection  and  the  faith  that  is  through 
him  are  the  inviolable  archives.''  Perhaps  Igna- 
tius is  not  to  be  interpreted  as  denying  all  right 
of  Jewish  Christians  to  observe  their  law,  but, 
rather,  is  thinking  of  a  degenerate  Judaism  and 
of  a  forcing  it  on  others.  But  his  peremptory 
anti-Jewish  tone  showed  that  he  wanted  no 
domination  of  the  Christian  conscience  by  Jew 
or  Jewish  Christian. 

More  remarkable  still  is  the  strange  so-called 
epistle  of  Barnabas,  the  date  of  which  no  one 
knows  (70-138),  but  the  place  of  which  is  per- 
haps Alexandria.  It  reveals  a  lack  of  apprecia- 
tion of  Judaism  truly  colossal,  a  most  inverted 
and  perverted  conception  of  its  meaning  and  his- 
torical  place.     That  whole  magnificent  revela- 

1  Ad  Mag.,  sections  8-10. 


The  Jewish  Crisis  29 

tion  is  an  error  and  impertinence,  and  God's 
covenant  in  the  Old  Testament  did  not  apply  to 
Jews  at  all,  but  to  Christians.  The  author  had 
no  historical  sympathy  or  breadth  of  view,  but 
by  a  "grotesque  and  bald  typology''  he  sacrifices 
the  mighty  literature  of  the  Old  Testament  or 
makes  it  into  a  mere  "fantastic  forestallment 
of  the  New."  It  is  singular  that  such  a  nar- 
row and  unhistoric  view  should  have  sprung 
from  the  cultured  circles  of  Alexandria,  but 
it  shows  that  then,  as  now,  there  were  those 
who  had  no  appreciation  of  the  divine  call 
of  Israel  and  of  its  place  in  the  purposes  of 
God.  But  it  was  in  this  very  Alexandria 
where  Kriiger^  thinks  the  book  was  written,  that 
Clement  looked  up  to  the  epistle  of  Barnabas  as 
a  sacred  writing,  the  work  of  the  apostle  Barna- 
bas,2  and  that  Origen  called  it  a  "catholic  epis- 
tle"2  and  apparently  esteemed  it  highly — which 
shows  that  Christian  culture  is  not  infallible. 
But  from  these  three  sources — Ignatius,  Barna- 
bas, and  Justin  Martyr — we  see  how  an  atmos- 
phere was  being  created  in  which  Jewish  Chris- 
tianity simply  could  not  live. 

It  may  be  that  this  pronounced  hostility  to  Ju- 
daism was  partly  responsible  for  the  increased 
departure  of  the  strict  Jewish  Christians  from 
the  apostolic  norm  of  teaching,  or,  vice  versa,  the 

»  History  of  Early  Christian  Literature,  tr.  1897,  p.  20. 
«  Stromata,  2.  6;  2.  20.  »  Contra  Celsum,  1.  63 


30  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

departure  may  have  accentuated  the  hostility. 
At  any  rate,  the  cleft  was  becoming  deep  and 
wide.    Cerinthus  is  an  illustration.    If  we  follow 
the  oldest  authority,  Irena3us  (about  A.  D.  170), 
we  have  the  famous  story, ^  on  the  authority  of 
Poly  carp,  that  once  John  found  himself  in  a  bath 
house  in   Ephesus  with  Cerinthus,   and  imme- 
diately rushed  out  without  bathing,  crying  out, 
''Let  us  fly,  lest  even  the  bath  house  fall  down, 
because  Cerinthus,  the  enemy  of  the  truth,  is 
within.''     This  reminds  us  of  John's  own  words 
(2  John  10,  11).    Certainly,  Cerinthus  was  here- 
tical enough.     The  earth  was  made  by  a  subor- 
dinate power,  who  knew  not  the  supreme  God. 
Jesus  was  not  born  of  a  virgin,  but  by  the  ordi- 
nary laws  of  generation,  though  he  was  more 
righteous,  wise,  and  prudent  than  other  men. 
After  his  baptism  Christ  descended  upon  Jesus 
in  the  form  of  a  dove,  and  the  latter  then  pro- 
claimed  the   unknown    Father,    and   performed 
miracles.     At  last  Christ  departed  from  Jesus, 
who  then  suffered  and  rose  again,  for  Christ 
could  not  suffer,  as  he  was  spiritual  being.^    Cer- 
tainly, such  a  formidable  departure  from  orignal 
Christianity  as  that  might  well  arouse  the  ani- 
mosity of  the  orthodox. 

By  and  by  the  members  of  this  extreme  Jewish 
party,  cut  off  from  the  correcting  influence  of  the 
body  of  believers,  with  whom  the  Spirit  of  Truth 

^Adversus  Hoereses,  3.  3.  ^  Irenaus,  1.  26. 


The  Jewish  Crisis  31 

dwells,  if  anywhere,  became  a  sect — the  Ebion- 
ites,  or  Humble,  or  Poor  Ones  (compare  the 
Friars  Minor,  the  Franciscans).  They  held* 
that  the  world  was  created  by  the  true  God,  but 
in  regard  to  Jesus  Christ  they  agreed  with  Cer- 
inthus.  They  used  the  Gospel  of  Matthew  only, 
repudiating  Paul  as  an  apostate  from  the  law. 
They  had  their  own  interpretation  of  the  proph- 
ets, practiced  circumcision,  observed  the  law,  and 
were  so  thoroughly  Jewish  that  they  adored  Jeru- 
salem as  if  it  were  the  house  of  God.  From  such 
circles  as  these  sprang  the  Syriac  text  of  the  Gos- 
pels found  on  Sinai  in  1892,  which  in  Matthew 
omits  the  virgin  birth  of  Jesus.  They  endured 
until  the  fifth  century,  shading  off  into  different 
varieties,  one  of  which^  reacted  toward  a  more 
Christian  view,  as  they  acknowledged  Paul  as  an 
apostle  to  the  Gentiles  and  received  the  virgin 
birth. 

Into  another  Jewish-Christian  party  heathen 
influences  poured.  I  refer  to  the  Elkesaites,  who 
played  a  part  in  the  second  and  third  centuries. 
They  held  to  circumcision  and  the  Sabbath,  to 
repeated  washings,  to  which  a  magical  cleansing 
and  reconciling  meaning  was  ascribed,  to  oath- 
formulas,  to  magic  and  astrology,  and  to  Jesus 
as  the  Messiah.    They  baptized  for  the  forgive- 


*  Irenceus,  1.  26,  2. 

'According  to  Jerome,  Epistle,  112,    §    13,    who   foimd    them   in 
Palestine. 


32  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

ness  of  sins  in  the  name  of  the  Great  and  High 
God  and  his  Son,  the  Great  King,  the  Messiah, 
and  saw  in  Jesus  an  incarnation  of  the  ideal 
Adam,  or  First  Man,  whom  they  also  called  the 
highest  archangel — perhaps  an  attempt  to  con- 
ceive Christianity  as  a  special  revelation  and  yet 
as  identical  with  Judaism. 

Finally  we  are  brought  to  those  perplexing  ro- 
mances, the  so-called  Clementines,  the  Homilies, 
and  Eecognitions,  which  in  their  present  form 
probably  arose  in  Kome  in  the  beginning  of  the 
third  century,  and  which  were  founded,  it  is  be- 
lieved by  critics,  on  an  older  Gnostic  Ebionitic 
original,  the  Homilies  being  worked  up  into  a 
polemic  against  Marcion's  views,  and  the 
Recognitions  independently  into  a  more  defi- 
nitely Christian  book,  and  both  having  a  kin- 
ship to  the  Antipauline  Gnostic  Acts  of  Paul.* 
The  universality  of  Christianity  is  acknowledged, 
but  looked  upon  as  merely  a  restoration  of  pure 
Mosaism.  For  Gentile  Christians  baptism  takes 
the  place  of  circumcision.  Religious  washings 
are  held  and  abstinence  from  flesh.  Pure  re- 
ligion was  revealed  in  Adam,  who  is  looked  upon 
as  the  representative  of  the  ideal  sinless  First 
Man,  or  of  the  Holy  Spirit  of  Christ,  who  ap- 
pears under  different  names  in  different  periods, 
until  he  finally  appears  in  Christ  and  makes  the 


1  M6lIer-von   Schubert,    KG.,    vol.    i,    p.    Ill,    whose    exposition 
follows. 


The  Jewish  Crisis  33 

primitive  pure  religion  universal.  He  was  espe- 
cially in  Moses,  whose  religion  became  perverted, 
but  was  renewed  in  its  purity  by  Christ.  Through 
the  whole  Clementines  there  breathes  a  religious 
philosophical  theory,  which  though  it  wants  to 
exclude  Gnosticism  proper,  yet  makes  conces- 
sions to  it,  and  so  is  a  "Gnostic"  Ebionism. 
While  Jewish  monotheism  is  strictly  maintained, 
a  cosmological  theory  is  developed  in  which 
Stoic  influences  play:  origin  of  the  w^orld  by  a 
transformation  of  the  divine  substance,  in  which 
also  the  coming  of  evil  is  conceivable,  without  a 
special  dualism.  Mutually  connected  opposi- 
tions (syzygies)  are  bound  up  with  the  entire 
world  development,  which  have  their  origin  in 
the  opposition  between  the  devil  and  the  Son  of 
God.  The  Clementines  are  the  attempt  to  natu- 
ralize conceptions  like  these  among  regular 
Christians. 

Thus  Jewish  Christianity — neither  one  thing 
nor  the  other — ran  itself  out  in  thin  vanishing 
lines,  until  it  reappeared  in  another  shape  in 
world-significant  movements  which  sprang  from 
Mani  and  Mohammed. 


CHAPTER  III 

The  Gnostic  Crisis:  or,  Shall  Christianity 
BE  Transformed  into  an  Oriental 
Theosophic  Cult  or  Chris- 
tian Science? 

There  were  principles  of  Christianity  which, 
if  pressed  in  a  one-sided  way,  might  lead  to 
openings  for  Gnosticism  {gnosis^  knowledge). 
The  idea  of  different  grades  of  Christian  attain- 
ment was  at  home  in  Christianity:  the  mystery 
which  only  the  perfect  could  know/  the  en- 
lightenment which  God  pours  into  the  minds  of 
his  elect  so  that  they  know  all  things,^  the  special 
blessing  of  those  deep  in  the  love  of  God — "unto 
all  riches  of  the  full  assurance  of  understand- 
ing,"^ and  the  gracious  gift  of  God — to  one  the 
word  of  wisdom  through  the  Spirit,  and  to  an- 
other the  word  of  knowledge  according  to  the 
same  Spirit.*  Grades  of  knowledge  were  re- 
flected even  in  the  New  Testament  literature: 
in  the  simple  narratives  of  the  first  three  Gospels, 
in  the  Epistles  of  Paul,  opening  here  and  there 
vistas  into  profound  truth,  and  finally  in  the 
wonderful  Gospel  of  John,  which  is  like  a  land- 
scape, now  charming  in  its  quiet  beauty  and  then 


1 1  Cor.  2.  6,  7;  3.  1,  2.  2  1  John  2.  20,  21.  »  Col.  2.  2. 

«  1  Cor.  12.  8. 

34 


The  Gnostic  Crisis  35 

piercing  the  sky  with  its  peaks,  or  revealing  un- 
fathomed  depths. 

Looking  beyond  Christianity  for  the  working 
of  that  strange,  multiform,  many-colored  thing 
we  call  Gnosticism,  it  meets  us  nearest,  perhaps, 
in  Philo,  the  philosophic  Jew  of  Alexandria,  who 
was  a  young  man  when  Christ  was  born.  To  him 
the  higher  knowledge  (gnosis)  was  directed  to 
piercing  into  the  alleged  deeper  meaning  of  the 
history,  myths,  mysteries,  and  doctrines  of  re- 
ligion. This  seemed  an  innocent  proceeding,  but 
it  had  in  it  elements  of  mischief.  The  same 
tendency  was  illustrated  in  Christian  writers — 
the  uncovering  of  the  deeper  sense  of  Scripture 
by  allegory,  "that  you  might  have  your  knowl- 
edge perfect,"  says  Barnabas  (§  1),  which  he 
helps  forward  by  a  perfectly  luxuriant  allegoriz- 
ing of  Old  Testament  laws  and  facts.  Clement  of 
Eome  does  the  same  to  a  less  degree  to  buttress 
his  ideas  of  church  order  (§§  40,  '43,  etc.),  and 
Justin  Martyr  explains  the  nobler  meanings  of 
the  commonplace  passages  of  the  Old  Testa- 
ment.^ It  was  the  custom — as  with  the  Stoics, 
Plutarch,  etc. — in  the  Hellenic  world  to  seek 
under  the  hull  of  the  myths  and  mysteries  the 
deeper  religious  or  philosophical  meanings. 
There  was  also  the  inclination  to  discover  the 
same  religious  ideas  in  different  mythological 
forms  and  cults,  to  adopt  or  mix  the  same  from 

1  Contra  Tryphonem,  §§11 1-113,  etc. 


36  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

these  various  sources  (syncretism),  and  espe- 
cially to  study  the  Oriental  cults  which  seemed 
to  come  to  them  in  the  light,  or  with  the  claim, 
of  the  original  revelation.  Thus  all  these  fantas- 
tic ideas  of  the  East  were  brought  into  the  West 
and  got  mixed  with  the  whole  movement  of 
Western  thought.  In  this  religious  ferment 
Christianity  also  worked  with  its  doctrine  of  re- 
demption and  of  the  world,  and  though  it  made 
the  claim  of  having  absolute  validity,  it  yet 
united  to  itself  the  most  different  religious 
views,  transforming  them  and  being  itself  trans- 
formed.^ 

What  were  some  of  the  elements  of  this 
Gnostic  ferment?  Syrophoenician  cosmogony 
and  the  astrology  and  magic  of  the  Orient.  Man 
and  all  the  lesser  spheres  of  creation  were  under 
the  influence  of  the  stars  or  heavens,  which  were 
thought  of  as  higher  spirits  standing  near  to  God 
and  ruling  the  world.  Redemption  was  con- 
ceived as  freeing  man  from  the  pressure  and 
power  of  finiteness,  in  which  these  heavenly 
powers  wish  to  keep  fast  the  soul.  There  was 
also  the  idea  of  middle  beings,  angels,  etc.,  as 
mediating  God;  behind  whom  God  disappears — 
an  idea  which  some  think  came  in  from  such 
semi-Jewish  sects  as  the  Essenes,  Samaritans, 
etc.  Then  there  were  borrowings  from  the  Greek, 
Pythagorean,  Philonic,  and  Stoic  philosophies, 

1  See  Moller-von  Schubert,  KG.,  vol.  i,  pp.  138flP.  (1902). 


The  Gnostic  Crisis  37 

and  finally  Christianity  itself  conceived  as  a 
religion  of  world-redemption.  There  was,  of 
course,  a  practical  side  to  all  this,  a  religion  of 
the  dedicated,  the  perfect,  an  esoteric  society, 
which  looks  upon  religion  as  a  secret  mysterious 
cult  in  which  the  members  were  the  select  ini- 
tiated, with  higher  knowledge  (compare  the  de- 
sire "to  know"  as  a  motive  in  the  liturgies  of 
some  secret  orders),  perhaps  reminding  us  of 
the  "knowledge  falsely  so  called"^  of  those  who 
creep  into  houses  and  with  specious  boasting  of 
superior  knowledge  lead  away  silly  women  and 
others  equally  weak  minded.^ 

The  success  of  these  apostles  of  the  Higher 
Science  was  due  in  part  to  the  unorganized  char- 
acter of  the  early  Church,  the  lack  of  responsible 
officers  and  teachers,  the  freedom  of  speaking  in 
the  congregation,  the  lack  of  well-defined  boun- 
daries of  worship,  creed,  and  structure,  and  the 
Church's  open  and  frank  attitude  toward  the 
Spirit,  the  giver  of  new  truth — what  Germans 
call  the  "enthusiastic"  character  of  early  Chris- 
tianity. There  were  prophets  who  spoke  under 
divine  afflatus ;  there  were  speakers  with  tongues ; 
healers,  and  those  possessed  of  other  heavenly 
powers.  The  Gnostics  took  hold  of  these  helps 
to  their  propaganda,  exploited  to  their  own  taste 
both  the  Old  Testament  and  the  literature  of  the 
apostles,  added  to  or  took  away  arbitrarily  from 

» 1  Tim.  6.  20.  »  2  Tim.  3.  6fif. 


38  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

this  literature/  and,  in  the  absence  of  authorita- 
tive norms  of  doctrine  and  of  fact,  the  poor  be- 
lievers were  the  footballs  of  these  "knowing'' 
ones,  and  were  in  danger  of  losing  all  real  hold  on 
their  faith.  The  very  historical  ground  of  Chris- 
tianity was  in  danger  of  being  dissolved  from 
under  the  feet  of  Christians,  and  they  foisted 
away  into  a  fog  of  hollow  speculation.  A  crisis 
indeed  had  come. 

How  grave  that  crisis  was  may  be  seen  by  a 
little  attention  to  the  nature  of  this  so-called 
Christian  Knowledge,  or  Science,  of  the  first, 
second,  and  third  centuries.  (1)  Christianity, 
which  was  originally  a  practical  doctrine  of  sal- 
vation through  faith  and  love,  becomes  a  specula- 
tive religious  theory  or  science  of  the  universe, 
a  knowledge  of  the  world-process,  which  knowl- 
edge leads  to  redemption  of  the  spirit.^  (2)  The 
creator  of  the  world  and  its  lawgiver  is  sepa- 
rated from  the  highest  God,  and  various  emana- 
tions go  out  from  the  original  divine  foundation, 
the  highest  God  being  too  glorious  to  mix  him- 
self directly  with  lesser  things.  The  fall  of  man 
itself  is  such  a  mixing  of  the  spirit  with  matter, 
worked  by  lower  ungodly  powers,  who  may  have 
had  to  do  with  present  appearance  and  conditions 
of  the  earth  and  world.^  (3)  Eedemption,  or 
the  freedom  of  man's  spirit,  is  accomplished  by 


1  Rev.  22.  18,  19.  '  Compare  Christian  Science. 

»  Compare  Eph.  6.  12,  R.  V. 


The  Gnostic  Crisis  39 

dissolution  of  the  world,  by  overcoming  cosmic 
powers,  and  emancipating  the  spirit  from  matter. 

(4)  A  dualistic  trait  runs  through  the  whole 
system,  though  in  various  degrees,  sometimes  go- 
ing so  far  as  two  original  principles,  or  Gods, 
and  then  fading  away  into  a  kind  of  pantheism. 

(5)  The  purely  religious  oppositions  between  the 
world  and  the  kingdom  of  God,  between  flesh 
and  spirit,  are  enlarged  into  oppositions  of  cos- 
mic powers,  and  thus  drawn  out  of  the  ethical, 
where  only  they  have  any  bearing  and  sense,  into 
the  physical.  (6)  Christ  is  placed  in  the  turn- 
ing point  of  the  religious  history  of  man,  who 
is  lifted  up  also  as  the  turning  point  of  the  whole 
cosmic  development.  Christ  means  the  coming 
in  and  revealing  of  the  divine  spiritual  principle 
in  the  visible  world,  the  revelation  of  the  hitherto 
concealed  God,  and  with  this  the  outgoing  of  a 
new  life  for  all  who  take  hold  of  this  revelation 
and  understand  it,  and  subject  themselves  to  the 
necessarv  ascetic  and  secret  conditions.^  (7)  A 
word  further  as  to  Christ.  As  the  Godhead  un- 
folds himself  in  different  divine  potencies,  or 
aeons,  so  Christ  is  thought  of  as  appearing  in  the 
world  as  one  of  these  potencies,  or  shining  out 
from  a  mixture  of  them.  But  Christ  as  a  heav- 
enly and  redeeming  potency  is  always  to  be  dis- 
tinguished from  his  visible  appearance,  which 
latter  is  to  be  considered  either  as  a  real  man 

^  Compare  Christian  Science. 


40  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

who  bears  for  the  time  the  heavenly  Christ,  or  as 
only  a  psychical  or  spiritual  (not  material)  for- 
mation or  image,  or  as  simply  an  appearance.^ 
(8)  Who  are  the  saved?  Here  we  must  distin- 
guish the  pneumatics,  or  spiritual,  who  are  able 
to  receive  the  divine  life  and  the  revelation  of  the 
Spirit,  and  the  hylics,  or  material,  who  are  irre- 
coverably fallen.  Some  Gnostics  define  also  the 
psychics,  who  are  incapable  of  the  proper  revela- 
tion of  the  Spirit,  but  who  are  able  by  faith  to 
come  to  a  certain  knowledge  of  the  divine,  and 
to  a  corresponding  blessedness.  ( 9 )  Over  against 
the  realistic  view  of  early  Christianity  as  to  the 
visible  return  of  Christ,  the  resurrection  of  the 
body,  and  the  glorious  kingdom  of  Christ, 
the  Gnostics  taught  the  opposite.  The  end  is  the 
freeing  the  spirit  from  sensuousness  and  the 
pain  of  finiteness.2  (10)  Finally,  Gnostic  ethics, 
as  may  be  imagined,  is  purely  dualistic.  The  op- 
position between  matter  and  spirit  is  conceived 
absolutely,  not  relatively  or  morally,  as  in  Chris- 
tianity. It  receives  a  metaphysical  foundation, 
and,  as  in  Christian  Science,  is  erected  into  a 
fundamental  principle.  There  was  a  healthy 
ascetic  strain  among  the  first  Christians,  a  volun- 
tary self-denial  under  special  circumstances  for 
a  higher  good,^  illustrated,  for  instance,  in  later 


1  Docetism:  compare  Christian  Science's  conception  of  matter. 

2  Compare  Hinduism. 

3  Matt.  19.  12;  1  Cor.  7.  7,  8,  26,  29-31;  9.  25-27. 


The  Gnostic  Crisis  41 

Church  history  in  the  wise  resolution  of  Bishop 
Asbury  to  remain  single.     But  this  asceticism 
for  moral  ends  was  changed  in  Gnosticism  into 
an  asceticism  involved  in  its  basic  ideas,  meta- 
physically grounded,  and  driven  to  its  highest 
point. ^    But  another  side  to  this  asceticism  was 
moral  looseness;  for  the  spirit  only  being  essen- 
tial, the  ordinary  external  things  of  life  were  in- 
different, whence  libertinism  or  antinomianism. 
From  the  above  statement  the  reader  can  see 
that  there  is  some  truth  in  Harnack's  speaking 
of  Gnosticism  as  the  acute  secularizing  or  Hellen- 
izing  of  Christianity .2     It  might  better  be  called 
the  Hellenizing  of  Eastern  theosophies,  with  the 
transfusion  of  Christian  elements  and  those  ele- 
ments perverted  in  the  process.     Professor  W. 
Walther  is  right  when  he  says^  that  Gnosticism 
is   a  development   on   heathen   ground,   "not   a 
Hellenizing  of  the  gospel,  but  a  stealing  of  some 
Christian    rags    to    cover   heathen    nakedness." 
Seeberg  is  better  still  when  he  says^  that  Gnos- 
ticism "sought  to  elevate  Christianity  to  the  po- 
sition of  the  universal  religion  by  combining  in 
it  all  the  tendencies  and  energies  of  the  age  and 
thus  adapting  it  to  the  comprehension  of  all  and 
satisfying  the  needs  of  all.    Thus  revelation  was 


1  Compare  Hinduism  and  Buddhism. 

2  History  of  Dogma,  vol.  i,  pp.  222,  230,  note. 
8  Theologisches  lAtcratur-Blatt,  1898,  col.  228. 

*  History  of  Doctrine,  vol.  i,  pp.  94,  100,  101. 


42  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

to  be  combined  with  the  wisdom  of  the  world, 
and  Christianity  by  this  means  became  a  uni- 
versal religion.  It  was  the  first  attempt  in  the 
history  of  the  Church  to  bring  the  world  into 
subjection  to  the  Church  by  interpreting  Chris- 
tianity in  harmony  with  the  wisdom  of  the  world. 
Under  the  conditions  then  existing  this  attempt 
appeared  to  be  assured  of  success,  and  it  seemed 
to  oppose  to  the  Gospel  of  the  Church  a  tremen- 
dous combination  of  forces.  . . .  Gnosticism  is  not 
merely  Gentile  Christian  in  character,  but  essen- 
tially heathenish.  The  fundamental  problem  to 
which  it  addresses  itself  originates  in  the  re- 
ligious thought  of  the  heathen  world,  as  well  as 
the  means  employed  in  the  solution  of  the  prob- 
lem. Its  character  is  not  altered  by  the  fact  that 
it  applies  the  instruments  of  Christian  and  Jew- 
ish tradition  to  the  problem  in  hand.  ...  It  is 
misleading  to  speak  of  it  as  the  acute  Helleniz- 
ing  of  Christianity,  or  to  say  with  Harnack  that 
its  leaders  were  the  first  Christian  theologians." 
Some  systems  had  Hellenistic  elements,  notably 
that  of  Valentine,  but,  "judged  as  a  historical 
phenomenon.  Gnosticism  was  the  attempt  to  es- 
tablish the  universal  religion,  in  which  the  re- 
ligious problems  of  the  educated  world  in  that 
age  should  be  answered  by  means  of  the  ancient 
Oriental  mythology  and  magic,''  with  the  addi- 
tion of  Christian  ideas.  "We  may,  accordingly, 
instead  of  Hellenizing,  speak,  rather,  of  an  ethni- 


The  Gnostic  Crisis  43 

cizing  of  the  gospel."     And  "ethnicizing"  here 
really  means  heathenizing. 

Especially  in  the  system  of  Marcion  (flourished 
A.  D.  155)  did  Gnosticism  present  itself  to  the 
Church  in  a  fascinating  light,  as  though  it  would 
deceive  the  very  elect,  reminding  us  in  its  subtly 
dangerous  appeal  to  the  susceptibilities  of  the 
half-instructed   Christians   of   that   day   of  the 
modern  Marcions  {mutatis  mutandis) — the  "ad- 
vanced" theologians  of  the  present.    The  God  of 
the  Old  Testament,  of  the  creation  and  of  the 
law,  appeared  to  him  as  the  hard,  "just,"  passion- 
ately angry  God,  finding  pleasure  in  war,  child- 
ish in  his  measures,  and  contradictory  in  his  con- 
clusions, for  he  feels  penitence,  the  creator  of  a 
by  no  means  perfect  world   ("without  doubt  a 
grand  work  and  a  world  worthy  of  God,"  was  the 
sarcasm  of  the  Marcionists),  and  also  the  bringer 
in  of  evil  ("I  am  he  that  creates  evil,"  he  says 
himself  in  the  Old  Testament).    Unless  you  ex- 
plain the  Old  Testament  allegorically,  there  is  in 
it  no  trace  of  the  God  of  love.    Nevertheless,  said 
Marcion,  the  God  of  the  Old  Testament  is  not  the 
principle  of  evil  over  against  the  good  highest 
God,  but  only  a  lesser,  limited  God,  the  world- 
ruler.     But   he   stands   in   close  relation   with 
the  hyle,  or  matter    (conceived  as  a.  principle 
or  personfication),  out  of  which   he  built  the 
world.      Over   both   is   the   highest    good   God, 
secret,    hidden,    resting    in    everlasting    inac- 


44  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

tivity/  who  has  a  higher  heavenly  world 
around  and  under  him.  Suddenly  the  good 
God  sends  his  Son  Christ  in  a  counterfeit  or 
seeming  body,  who  appeared  in  the  time  of  Pilate 
in  Judaea,  revealed  God,  and  authenticated  him- 
self by  miracles.  As  he  did  away  with  the  law 
and  prophets  and  all  the  works  of  the  world- 
creator,  he  was  crucified  by  the  princes  of  this 
world,^  the  angel  powers  of  the  creator,  which 
crucifixion,  however,  did  not  harm  him,  on  ac- 
count of  the  unreality  of  his  body.  He  pro- 
claimed the  religion  of  love  and  of  freedom  from 
the  law  of  the  creator,  though  not  in  a  libertine 
sense.  The  faithful  to  whom  the  good  God  is 
revealed  must  abstain  as  far  as  possible  from 
the  pleasures  and  goods  of  this  world,  especially 
from  sexual  intercourse  and  the  use  of  flesh,  for 
the  body  has  no  part  in  salvation.  As  every- 
thing rests  upon  faith  in  the  divine  love,  Cain 
and  the  evildoers  of  the  Old  Testament,  as  well 
as  all  heathen,  are  saved  by  the  Redeemer  de- 
scending to  Hades,  as  they  all  turn  to  him  with 
longing,  while  the  pious  of  the  Old  Testament 
have  no  trust  in  the  proclamation  and  remain  in 
Hades.  , 

As  all  this  was  contrary  to  the  gospel  the 
Church  had  received,  Marcion  had  to  sift  the 
tradition,  and  he  did  this  with  a  vengeance.  He 
claimed  that  the  Judaizers  had  falsified  the  gos- 

>  Compare  the  religions  of  India.  « 1  ©or.  2.  8, 


The  Gnostic  Crisis  45 

pel  from  the  beginning,  the  only  genuine  written 
remains  of  which  were  the  ten  epistles  of  Paul 
(omitting  the  pastoral  epistles)  and  the  Gospel 
of  Luke,  but  these  only  in  an  amended  form. 

From  this  the  reader  will  hardly  be  prepared 
for  Lipsius's  favorable  description  of  Marcion- 
ism  as  the  Protestantism  of  the  ancient  Church, 
for  the  reason  that  Protestantism  proclaimed 
fundamental  Christianity,  while  Marcionism  pro- 
claimed fundamental  heathenism  with  Christian 
elements.  But  it  proclaimed  its  message  with 
such  wise  adjustment  to  the  spirit  of  the  times, 
and  with  such  plausibility  to  those  who  were 
ignorant  of  the  true  nature  of  the  Old  Testament, 
that  it  had  a  wide  vogue.  By  the  time  of  Epiph- 
anius  (close  of  fourth  century)  it  had  spread 
from  Persia  to  Italy,  from  Pontus  to  Upper 
Egypt.  It  came  into  sympathetic  contact  with 
the  mighty  movement  of  Manicheism,  and,  ac- 
cording to  some,  formed  the  basis  of  the  Paulician 
Church  of  the  seventh  century. 

How  was  Gnosticism  overcome?  (1)  By  direct 
refutations  by  the  Church  fathers.  It  prompted 
theological  defense  and  thus  gave  birth  to  Chris- 
tian theology.  The  fathers  whetted  their  dia- 
lectic on  the  Gnostic  grindstone.  Think  of  the 
noble  vindications  of  Christian  truth  by  Ire- 
naeus,  Tertullian,  Clement  of  Alexandria,  Origen, 
Hippolytus — a  challenge  to  the  modern  minister 
to  a  like  battle  for  the  faith  against  present-day 


46  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

errors.  (2)  The  lack  of  a  brief  ready  confession 
of  the  faith  made  it  easy  for  the  Gnostics  to  win 
converts  from  the  ignorant.  To  gather  up  the 
apostolic  faith  in  a  few  short  statements,  to  ex- 
press the  fundamental  facts  of  the  life  of  Christ 
over  against  Gnostic  evaporation — this  was  a 
need  everywhere  felt,  and  it  led,  consciously  or 
unconsciously,  to  the  Rule  of  Faith — little  state- 
ments of  the  main  things  believed  by  Christians, 
which,  helped  along  by  baptismal  formulas,  by 
catechetical  needs,  issued  in  the  later  creeds.  I 
do  not  mean  that  there  were  not  such  statements 
in  some  churches  earlier  than  the  Gnostic  prop- 
aganda, and  independent  of  it;  but  there  can  be 
no  doubt  that  the  latter  helped  along  the  prepara- 
tion and  use  of  creeds  and  their  elevation  to 
Rules  of  Faith.  What  gave  distinct  occasion  to 
the  Christian  society  at  Rome  to  make  its  symbol 
a  creed  or  rule,  says  Kattenbusch,^  was  Gnosti- 
cism and  Marcionism.  "The  error  of  these 
movements  was,  of  course,  in  many  points  per- 
ceived. But  they  were  found  chiefly  in  contradic- 
tion with  the  symbol,  the  solemn  sum  of  the  faith, 
which  could  not  be  very  well  first  formed  under 
the  title  of  a  ^sanctuary'  (or  holy  relic — Heil- 
tums),  but  very  soon  became  such.  It  was  a 
natural  growth  when  the  sacramentum  of  faith 
became  a  wall  against  gnosis  and  Marcion."  (3) 
Another  weapon  was  the  New  Testament  ration- 

1  Das  Apostolische  Symbol,  vol.  ii  (1900),  pp.  82,  83. 


The  Gnostic  Crisis  47 

ally  interpreted,  and  especially  the  fixing  of  the 
limits  of  that  Testament  over  against  the  swarm 
of  false  Gospels,  Acts,  and  Epistles  put  out  by 
the  errorists,  and  sometimes — truth  to  tell — ex- 
ploited by  the  Church  (though  this  last  not  al- 
ways done  deliberately  from  a  known  false  book) . 
One  of  these  was  the  Gospel  of  Peter,  fragments 
of  which  were  found  by  the  French  diggers  in 
Akhmin,  Upper  Egypt,  in  the  winter  of  1886-7 
and  first  published  in  Paris  in  1892  by  Bouriant, 
the  director  of  the  French  Archaeological  Insti- 
tute in  Cairo,  as  a  part  of  the  ninth  volume  of  the 
Memoires  of  that  Institute  (editions  by  various 
scholars  in  1893),  and  which  made  such  a  noise 
at  the  time.     It  is  a  mild.  Gnostic    (Docetic) 
Gospel  written  in  Syria  after  the  middle  of  the 
second  century.    But  to  find  out  for  a  certainty 
what  the  New  Testament  was,  and  rightly  ex- 
plain it,  was  a  task  thrown  upon  the  Christians 
by  the  Gnostics.    It  is  an  ill  wind  that  blows  no 
one  any  good. 

But,  besides  all  these  things.  Gnosticism  was 
overcome  by  absorption,  not  simply  individual 
Gnostics  won  back  into  the  Church,  but  their 
views,  methods,  etc.,  taken  up  by  the  Church. 
Their  mystery  cults  influenced  the  Catholic  bap- 
tism and  Lord's  Supper;  their  philosophy  as  to 
the  hidden  God  and  the  intermediate  beings  be- 
tween him  and  man  reacted  on  the  Catholic  con- 
ception of  the  awful  and  infinite  One  who  better 


48  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

be  approached  through  saints,  angels,  and  espe- 
cially the  Virgin  Mary;  their  division  of  men 
into  pneumatic  or  spiritual,  psychic,  and  hylic, 
and  their  call  of  the  former  to  abstinence  and  a 
lofty,  self-denying  holiness,  worked  on  Catholic 
Christianity  with  mighty  force,  and  helped  to 
produce  monasticism  and  many  practical  phases 
of  the  ancient  and  mediaeval  Church,  which  are 
still  in  evidence  on  every  hand.  Then  there 
was  an  approach  to  the  Church  on  the  part  of 
some  Gnostics,  as,  for  instance,  Apelles,  who 
said^  that  "those  who  trusted  in  the  Crucified 
would  be  saved,  if  only  they  were  found  doing 
good  works,''  and  also  that  Christ  had  an  actual 
body  and  one  that  could  suffer,  though  a  heavenly 
one.  The  Docetists,  described  by  Hippolytus,^ 
could  hardly  be  distinguished  from  the  Church 
in  several  of  their  teachings.  It  is  remarkable 
also  that  Tatian  (flourished  A.  D.  160)  even  after 
he  became  a  Gnostic  (Encratite)  enjoyed  high 
honor  in  the  Church.  This  is  shown  by  the  wide 
acceptance  of  his  Gospel  Harmony,  or  Diates- 
seron,  a  blending  together  in  a  united  story  (in 
Syriac)  of  our  four  Gospels,  beginning  with  the 
first  verses  of  John,  but  omitting  the  genealogies 
in  Matthew  and  Luke  and  every  other  passage 
which  shows  that  the  Lord  sprang  according  to 
the  flesh  from  the  seed  of  David,  and  occasionally 

*  Eusebius,  Historia  Ecclesiastica,  5.  13,  5. 
^  Philosophumena,  8.  8ff. 


The  Gnostic  Crisis  49 

incorporating  passages  not  in  our  Gospels.     In 
the  east  Syrian  Church  this  Harmony  was  in 
favor  till  the  fourth  century,  suppressed  first  in 
the  fifth.    In  the  former  century  the  great  Church 
doctor    Ephraem    wrote   a   commentary    on    it, 
though  without  mentioning  the  name  of  Tatian, 
copying  the  most  of  it  in  his  book.     That  com- 
mentary  was  translated  into  Armenian  in  the 
next  century,  lay  in  Armenian  manuscripts  until 
1836,  when  it  was  published  by  the  Mechitarist 
Armenian  monks  of  San  Lazzaro,  Venice,  trans- 
lated into  Latin  by  one  of  them,  Father  Aucher, 
in  1841,  but  not  published,  and  this  translation 
revised  and  edited  and  published  at  Venice  in 
1876  by  Moesinger,  one  of  the  theological  pro- 
fessors  in   the   Roman    Catholic    university    at 
Salzburg.    It  is  singular  that  the  significance  of 
this  unexpected  recovery  of  a  gospel  harmony 
which  reaches  back  to  less  than  a  life  time  of  the 
death  of  the  apostle  John  escaped  the  tireless 
ever-searching  eyes  of  German  scholars,  the  first 
notice  of  it  being  a  passing  one-line  reference  of 
Nestle   in   the   Theologische   Literatur-Zeitung, 
1878  (December  7),  col.  607. 

An  American  has  the  honor  of  being  the  first 
to  call  the  attention  of  the  learned  world  to 
this  priceless  possession — Professor  Ezra  Abbot 
(died  1884),  in  his  The  Authorship  of  the  Fourth 
Gospel:  External  Evidences  (Boston,  1880,  pp. 
52-56).     In  1881  Zahn  reconstructed  the  text 


50  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

with  fine  skill,  and  in  the  Zeitschrift  fiir  Kirchen- 
geschichte  for  February,  1881  (vol.  iv,  Heft  4, 
pp.  471-505),  Harnack  presents  an  exhaustive 
study  of  it,  using  Moesinger  only,  written  inde- 
pendently of  Abbot  and  Zahn.  It  seems  to  bring 
those  old  Gnostics  home  to  us  to  have  one  of  them 
who  was  active  A.  D.  130-170  construct  for  us 
the  first  gospel  harmony  ever  produced,  in  which 
the  Gospel  of  John  is  used  as  a  book  everywhere 
acknowledged  as  divine,  on  a  perfect  level  with 
Mark  and  Matthew — this  Gospel  which  Baur 
said  never  existed  till  after  A.  D.  150. 

On  the  other  hand,  speaking  of  the  absorption 
of  Gnostic  ideas  and  usages  by  the  Church,  we 
must  not  lay  too  much  weight  there.  For  in- 
stance, Augustine  did  not  get  his  doctrine  of  the 
will  and  of  predestination  from  the  Gnostics  or 
Manicheans,  but  from  a  perverted  understand- 
ing of  Paul.  But  the  second  and  third  century 
fathers  bitterly  opposed  the  Gnostic  denial  of 
free  will.  As  Harnack  says,^  Gnosticism  "was 
wrecked  in  the  Church  on  free  will,  the  Old  Tes- 
tament, and  eschatology.''  That  man  is  free  and 
responsible,  that  the  Old  Testament  is  from  the 
supreme  God,  who  is  also  the  Creator,  that  the 
body  is  sacred  and  is  to  be  raised  at  the  last  day, 
and  that  Christ,  who  came  in  actual  flesh  once, 
is  to  come  again  in  power  at  the  end — these  were 
some  of  the  precious  possessions  of  the  early 

1  History  of  Dogma,  vol.  I,  p.  260,  note. 


The  Gnostic  Crisis  51 

Church  which  were  so  firmly  a  part  of  her  very 
being  that  with  them  she  overcame  the  Gnostic 
peril.  Gnostics  used  the  term  "of  the  same  sub- 
stance" (ofioovaiog)  of  Christ  in  relation  to  God, 
just  as  the  Church  came  to  use  it  later,  and  they 
sometimes  seem  to  identify  Christ  with  God,  but 
that  does  not  mean,  as  Harnack  thinks  it  does,* 
that  the  Church  "learned  very  much  in  Christol- 
ogy"  from  them,  or  that  they  had  a  "mighty  in- 
fluence on  the  later  Church  development  of 
Christology."  At  the  bottom  their  doctrine  of 
Christ  was  at  an  infinite  remove  from  that  of 
the  Church,  and  their  idea  of  "two  natures"  had 
nothing  in  common  with  the  idea  of  the  Church. 
The  absolutely  genuine  human  nature  of  Christ, 
who  was  linked,  nevertheless,  in  indissoluble 
union  with  the  Father — that  was  the  inexpug- 
nable conviction  of  primitive  Christianity,  and 
on  that  rock  the  fantastic  theories  of  Gnosticism, 
however  some  of  these  were  refined  and  Chris- 
tianized by  noble  and  holy  men  who  were  "not 
far  from  the  kingdom,"  broke  in  vain. 

1  History  of  Dogma,  vol.  i,  p.  259,  note. 


CHAPTER  IV 

The  Montanist  Crisis  :  or,  Is  Christianity  a 
Progressive  Religion? 

There  were  some  characteristics  of  primitive 
Christianity  which,  as  they  have  passed  away  or 
changed  their  form,  are  apt  to  be  slurred  over  by 
present-day  readers.  One  of  these  was  prophecy, 
the  speaking  or  writing  under  the  immediate 
divine  afflatus,  under  the  special  (whether  mirac- 
ulous or  not  we  need  not  inquire)  inspiration  of 
the  Holy  Spirit,  so  that  the  product  was  directly 
from  God.  This  was  a  tremendous  force  in  early 
Christianity.  Nearly  every  congregation  had  its 
prophets,  both  men  and  women,  held  in  high 
honor,  whose  words  were  listened  to  as  the  very 
word  of  God.  For  a  hundred  years  or  so  after  the 
founding  of  the  Church  on  the  day  of  Pentecost 
there  was  not  a  breath  of  suspicion  but  that  this 
mighty  class  of  workers  had  a  permanent  func- 
tion in  the  Church,  the  only  question  being  that 
of  preventing  the  abuse  of  that  function,  and 
guarding  the  office  from  unworthy  men,  who 
would  selfishly  exploit  their  high  reputation. 
For  instance,  as  late  as  perhaps  A.  D.  125  the 
Didache,  or  Teaching  of  the  Twelve  Apostles,  in 
laying  down  rules  for  the  government  of  the 
Church,  couples  apostles  and  prophets  together 

52 


The  Montanist  Crisis  53 

as  men  of  equal  honor  (11.3).  It  says  that  every 
prophet  who  speaks  in  the  Spirit  shall  not  be 
proved;  that  is,  no  one  shall  sit  in  judgment 
merely  on  the  contents  of  the  prophet's  message, 
as  that  would  be  an  unforgivable  sin.  All  that 
is  allowed  is  to  judge  the  prophet's  conduct,  and 
from  that  to  receive  or  reject  him.  If  he  orders 
a  table  (that  is,  either  an  ordinary  dinner  or  a 
eucharistic  meal)  in  the  Spirit  and  eats  of  it, 
he  is  no  true  prophet.  If  he  performs  a 
"cosmic  mystery''  for  the  Church — probably 
some  striking  symbolical  act  of  deep  mystical 
significance — and  does  not  teach  others  to  do 
the  same  thing,  he  shall  not  be  judged.  If 
he  asks  for  money,  however,  he  is  to  be  in- 
stantly rejected,  though  if  he  asks  for  the  poor 
no  one  is  to  judge  him  (11.  7-12).  If  he  de- 
sires to  settle  among  you,  see  that  he  gets  sup- 
port ;  in  fact,  you  shall  give  the  prophets  the  first 
fruits  of  your  produce,  for  they  are  your  chief 
priests  (which  last  word  is  not  to  be  interpreted 
in  a  sacerdotal  sense,  which  was  a  later  develop- 
ment ;  what  is  meant  is,  they  are  the  chief  of  those 
who  receive  and  offer  your  gifts,  and  present  the 
prayers  of  the  society  to  God ;  the  prophets  were 
not  ordained,  being,  from  the  modern  point  of 
view,  laymen).  If  you  have  no  prophet,  give  to 
the  poor  (13.  1,  3,  4) — a  recommendation  which 
points  to  a  time  when  the  prophets  were  not  in 
every  society,  were  apparently  not  as  numerous 


54  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

as  formerly,  but  were  giving  away  to  the  regular 
Church  officers,  in  whose  interest  it  was  to  shove 
them  to  one  side  and  hurry  their  extinction.  In 
the  eucharistic  dinners  certain  prayers  are  given 
which  the  congregation  may  use,  but  the  reser- 
vation is  distinctly  made  that  the  prophets  are 
not  at  all  bound  by  such  forms,  "but  may  give 
thanks  as  much  as  (in  what  words,  oaa)  they 
wish"  (10.  7).  As  Harnack  well  says,^  in  this 
document  the  "prophets  are  the  virtuosi  of  the 
eucharistic  prayer.'' 

Another  peculiarity  of  ancient  Christianity 
which  largely  passed  away  even  in  the  second 
century  was  ecstatic  utterance.  Prophets  and 
others  would  give  forth  revelations  or  other  re- 
ligious communications  in  a  rapt,  semiconscious 
state,  as  though  the  soul  were  borne  out  of  itself, 
as  though  the  words  came  from  the  inner  deeps 
impelled  by  a  higher  power.  Of  course  it  was  not 
meant  that  the  speaker  was  in  a  trance  or  un- 
conscious, but  his  utterance  was  involuntary  in 
the  sense  of  not  only  not  being  premeditated  but 
not  being  the  result  of  reflection  or  conscious  in- 
tellectual effort.  Prophets,  as  a  rule,  both  in 
apostolic  and  post-apostolic  times  spoke  in  this 
way,  and  when  we  read  of  "speaking  in  the 
Spirit"  it  refers  to  ecstatic  utterance.  In  this 
chill  age  of  intellectual  pride  and  aloofness  we 


1  In  his  edition  of  the  Didache  (Texte  und  Untersuchungen,  ii.  I), 
X884,  p.  37, 


The  Montanist  Crisis  55 

must  not  assume  that  there  were  not  real  com- 
munications from  God  in  these  states.  It  might 
easily  happen  that  men  who  stood  in  a  frank  and 
cordial  attitude  to  the  eternal  Truth  pressing  in 
on  them  from  all  sides,  at  a  time  when  the  con- 
trol of  the  mental  processes  had  not  reached  a 
science,  when  the  spiritual  atmosphere  charged 
to  the  utmost  with  religious  forces  playing  on 
souls  sensitive,  eager,  expectant,  full  of  faith  and 
hope — it  might  easily  happen,  I  say,  that  be- 
lievers naturally  endowed  with  a  semiclairvoyant 
nature,  who  saw  more  things  than  were  dreamed 
of  by  the  philosophy  of  skeptics,  were  carried  out 
of  themselves  by  the  Spirit  Divine,  and  in  a  half- 
conscious  state  gave  forth  messages  from  God. 

Ye  could  not  read  the  marvel  in  his  eye, 
The  still  serene  abstraction;  he  hath  felt 
The  vanities  of  after  and  before.     .     .     . 
He  often  lying  broad  awake,  and  yet 
Remaining  from  the  body,  and  apart 
In  intellect  and  power  and  wUl,  hath  heard 
Time  flowing  in  the  middle  of  the  night, 
And  all  things  creeping  to  a  day  of  doom. 

The  early  Church  was  also  filled  with  an  en- 
thusiastic belief  in  the  near  end  of  the  world 
and  the  coming  of  Christ  to  set  up  his  kingdom 
with  power  and  glory.  Hardly  anything  sepa- 
rates more  deeply  the  spiritual  feeling  of  the  first 
and  second  century  Christian  from  that  of  the 
modern  than  this  cleft.  The  former  really  be- 
lieved that  his  Lord  would  return  any  day  and 


56  '        Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

was  looking  for  it,  just  as  we  expect  a  returning 
friend,  while  the  latter,  with  rare  exceptions, 
does  not  believe  that  Christ  is  to  return  at  all, 
or  only  spiritually  and  in  historical  crises ;  or  he 
places  his  return  at  the  end  of  the  natural  life 
history  of  this  globe,  which  end,  according  to 
scientists,  though  it  is  bound  to  come,  will  not 
take  place  for  some  millions  of  years.  In  the 
first  Church  the  second  coming  of  Christ  was  a 
living  reality  of  faith ;  that  is,  among  the  devout. 
Of  course  there  were  doubters  (2  Pet.  3.  4),  but 
they  did  not  affect  the  general  run. 

This  faith  naturally  led  to  self-denials,  to 
ascetic  and  strenuous  achievements  in  piety  and 
prayer,  in  life  and  thought,  of  which  the  ancient 
literature  gives  us  a  glimpse  now  and  then. 
Paul's  example  was  followed  by  others,  in  the 
midst  of  a  corrupt,  decaying,  persecuting  world, 
at  whose  door  the  Christ  was  standing!  As  the 
second  century  wore  away  and  there  were  no 
signs  of  his  coming,  expectancy  naturally  re- 
laxed, and  with  that.  Church  discipline,  and  with 
that,  morals.  While  those  who  had  lapsed  from 
the  Church  on  account  of  the  persecution,  or 
other  mortal  sins,  had  not  been  received  in  again, 
even  though  penitent,  because  their  case  might 
soon  be  taken  up  by  the  Great  Judge,  now  that 
the  hope  of  his  coming  was  growing  weak,  they 
were  taken  back  into  membership  with  but  light 
penances.    No  doubt  it  is  easy  to  exaggerate  the 


The  Montanist  Crisis  57 

so-called  "enthusiasm"  of  the  early  Church,  the 
strained  and  lofty  devotion,  the  indifference  to 
civic  duties,  the  ever  looking  into  the  heavens  for 
the  descent  of  the  Son  of  man,  the  praying  with- 
out ceasing,  because  there  is  evidence  that  the 
Christians  then  were  not  so  vastly  different  from 
what  they  are  to-day.  They  bought  and  sold, 
they  married  and  were  given  in  marriage,  they 
entered  into  heathen  amusements  and  heathen 
society,  and  those  of  superabundant  faith  and 
love  were  in  a  minority  then,  as  they  have 
always  been.  But  at  the  same  time  it  is  true  that 
in  the  first  Church  the  belief  in  the  approaching 
end  gave  a  spiritual  tone,  an  other-worldliness, 
and  in  some  cases  an  ascetic  self-discipline,  which 
perished  with  the  loss  of  that  faith.  "For  we 
have  not  here  an  abiding  city,"  was  their  cry, 
"but  we  seek  after  the  city  which  is  to  come" 
(Heb.  13.  14).  Every  day  that  the  coming  was 
delayed  seemed  a  call  for  patience,  like  a  mother 
who  is  worn  out  waiting  for  her  boy.  "For  ye 
have  need  of  patience,  that,  having  done  the  will 
of  God,  ye  may  receive  the  promise.  For  yet  a 
very  little  while,  he  that  cometh  shall  come,  and 
shall  not  tarry"  (Heb.  10.  36,  37).  Therefore  do 
not  encumber  yourselves  with  earthly  affairs,  but 
lay  up  your  treasures  above.  "You  know  that 
you  servants  of  God  dwell  in  a  foreign  land,  for 
your  city  is  far  from  this  city.  If,  then,  you 
know  the  city  where  you  are  to  dwell,  why  pro- 


vide  yourselves  here  with  fields  and  expensive 
luxuries  and  buildings  and  chambers  to  no  pur- 
pose? He  who  makes  such  provision  for  this  city 
has  no  mind  for  his  own  city.  ...  So  beware  that 
you  serve  God  and  have  him  in  your  heart ;  per- 
form his  works,  mindful  of  his  commandments 
and  of  the  promises  he  has  made,  in  the  faith  that 
he  will  perform  the  latter  if  the  former  be  ob- 
served. Instead  of  fields,  then,  buy  souls  in 
trouble;  visit  widows  and  orphans;  expend  on 
such  fields  and  houses  [the  poor]  which  God  has 
given  to  you  your  wealth  and  all  your  pains."  ^ 
"From  the  very  first,''  says  Harnack,  "morality 
was  inculcated  within  the  Christian  churches 
in  two  ways — by  the  spirit  of  Christ  and  by  the 
conception  of  judgment  and  recompense.  Both 
were  marked  by  a  decided  bent  to  the  future,  for 
the  Christ  of  both  was  he  who  was  to  return.  To 
the  mind  of  primitive  Christianity  the  'present' 
and  the  'future'  were  sharply  opposed  to  each 
other  and  it  was  their  opposition  which  fur- 
nished the  principle  of  self-control  with  its  most 
powerful  motive.  It  became,  indeed,  with  many 
a  sort  of  glowing  passion.  The  Church  which 
prayed  at  every  service,  'May  grace  come,  and 
this  world  pass  away:  maranatha'  [Our  Lord 
is  come,  or,  Our  Lord  is  coming]  was  the  Church 
which  gave  directions  like  those  we  read  in  the 
opening  parable  of  Hermas.     'From  the  lips  of 

1  Hennas,  perhaps  A.  D,  150,  Shepherd,  Sim.  1.. 


The  MoNTANisT  Crisis  59 

all  Christians  this  word  is  to  be  heard :  The  world 
is  crucified  to  me  and  I  to  the  world.'  "^ 

Now  these  things  were  the  historical  back- 
ground of  Montanism.  A  change  was  coming  over 
the  Christian  Church  of  the  second  century,  and 
by  A.  D.  150  that  change  was  sufficiently  marked 
to  cause  alarm  to  serious  men.  The  regular 
Church  officers  were  magnifying  their  positions, 
and  whenever  possible  taking  the  places  of  the 
prophets  in  honor  and  influence.  Especially  was 
this  true  of  the  bishops,  whose  office  in  the  an- 
cient and  mediaeval  Church  was  so  frequently  as- 
sociated with  unchristian  ambitions  and  ideas. 
They  were  the  "sane,''  "sound"  men,  who  could 
be  trusted  to  steer  the  bark  of  the  Church 
through  troublous  waters,  while  the  prophets 
were  so  open  to  the  influences  of  the  Spirit,  to 
promptings  from  eerie  voices  from  the  other 
world,  that  they  were  removed  from  that  admin- 
istrative region  where  good  judgment  was  essen- 
tial, a  region  which  circumstances  were  ever  mak- 
ing more  important.  The  communications  given 
in  ecstasy — if  they  were  intelligible — had  to  be 
judged  (even  when  in  theory  the  people  were  not 
allowed  to  judge  them,  their  being  accepted 
meant  a  process  of  discrimination),  and  if  they 
were  not  intelligible  they  were  useless.  Ecstatic 
utterance  was  going  out  of  favor.    The  writings 


»Celsus,  A.  D.  177-180;  cited  by  Origen,  Contra  Celsum,  5.  64: 
Harnack,  Expansion  of  Christianity,  vol.  i  (1904),  pp.  117,  118. 


60  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

of  the  apostles  were  taking  the  place  of  the 
chance  teachings  of  the  prophets;  of  course  not 
entirely,  for  the  prophets  lived  on  for  some  time 
yet,  but  that  was  the  tendency.  Besides,  the  ex- 
pectation of  the  end  was  partially  dying  out,  and 
Christians  generally  began  to  build  upon  a  longer 
endurance  of  the  world.  So  there  came  a  loss 
of  the  old  self-sacrificing  devotion,  and  worldli- 
ness  and  vice  crept  into  the  Church.  Not  that 
these  did  not  exist  before,  but  on  account  of  the 
postponement  of  the  Parousia,  or  second  coming, 
there  came  a  widely  diffused  lowering  of  spir- 
itual tone,  which  men  viewed  with  alarm. 

Montanus,  the  Phrygian  Christian  prophet, 
stepped  upon  the  stage  about  A.  D.  155.  It  was 
fitting  that  the  conflict  between  the  new  and  old 
ideals  should  be  fought  first  in  Asia  Minor.  In 
the  second  century  Christianity  and  Christian 
thought  was  nowhere  so  active,  so  expansive  as 
there.  There  the  first  great  theologians  and 
ecclesiastics  were  born;  there  all  the  first  con- 
troversies were  precipitated;  there  the  Easter 
question  came  out;  there  men  brooded  over  the 
Logos,  the  Word,  and  the  relation  of  the  Christ 
to  the  Father;  there  the  ojBfice  of  bishop  as  dis- 
tinct from  presbyter  first  developed;  there  the 
prophets  were  most  active ;  there  first  the  bishops 
tried  to  supersede  them ;  and  it  was  natural  that 
just  there  the  Montanist  crisis  should  come  to  a 
head.     To  all  this  persecution  helped.     Since 


The  Montanist  Crisis  61 

about  A.  D.  150  it  grew  ever  more  widely,  and 
persecution  always  sharpens  opposition  to  the 
world.  It  generally  enhances  also  the  expecta- 
tion of  the  end  and  gives  a  background  for  pro- 
phetic or  similar  voices. 

It  has  been  claimed  by  some  that  old  heathen 
Phrygia  had  something  to  do  with  explaining 
Montanism— certain  religious  and  social  char- 
acteristics  which    stamped    themselves    on    the 
Christianity  of  that  region.    "In  the  nature  re- 
ligion of  the  ancient  Phrygians/'  says  Neander,^ 
"we  recognize  the  character  of  this  mountain 
race,   inclined   to   fanaticism   and  superstition, 
easily  credulous  about  magic  and  ecstatic  trans- 
ports; and  we  cannot  be  surprised  to  find  the 
Phrygian  temperament,  which  displayed  itself  in 
the  ecstasies  of  the  priests  of  Cybele  and  Bacchus, 
exhibiting  itself  once  more  in  the  ecstasies  and 
somnambulisms  of  the  Montanists."    Now,  it  is 
no  doubt  true  that  Christianity  assumes  different 
phases  in  different  nations;  you  could  not  con- 
ceive of  Methodism  being  born  in  France,  or  even 
perhaps  in  Germany.     It  is  the  glory  of  Chris- 
tianity that  it  can  take  on  different  forms  accord- 
ing to  social  types  and  yet  remain  essentially  un- 
changed—a fact  that  we  need  to  remember  in 
our  world-wide  missi(>n,  and  not  try  to  make 
American  Christians  of  Koreans  and  Russians. 
But  it  is  a  good  rule  not  to  seek  for  remote  causes 

1  Church  History,  Torrey's  tr.,  vol.  i,  p.  513, 


62  Crises  in  the  Eaely  Church 

in  things  the  springs  of  which  lie  at  your  very 
hand.  And  it  is  true  that  every  one  of  the  pecu- 
liarities of  Montanism  which  have  been  traced 
back  to  old  Phrygia,  her  religion  and  her  national 
traits,  it  got  straight  from  Christianity.  Even 
as  far  back  as  1841,  when  the  brilliant  pupil  of 
Baur,  F.C.Albert  Schwegler  (the  same  who  wrote 
the  History  of  Philosophy^  which  has  been  used 
so  widely  as  a  text-book  in  English-speaking 
lands,  and  who  died  at  the  early  age  of  38),  pub- 
lished his  learned  study, ^  scholars  have  been  in- 
clined to  place  but  little  emphasis  on  the  Phry- 
gian origins  of  Montanism,  for,  as  Schwegler 
says  (pp.  82,  83),  the  Phrygian  nature  religion 
offers  either  too  much  or  too  little  for  our  pur- 
pose ;  too  much  in  that  the  whole  external  shape 
and  equipment  of  that  religion  is  sought  for  in 
vain  in  Montanism,  and  too  little  in  that  it  does 
not  explain  the  constitutive  elements  of  the  latter 
as  a  Christian  movement.  While  it  would  be 
vain  to  deny  Phrygian  influence,  it  is  superfluous 
to  look  there  for  any  driving  impulse.  Baur  him- 
self had  the  insight  to  see  this.  He  says  truly^ 
that  "Montanism  is  rooted  altogether  in  the 
original  Christian  faith  of  the  Parousia  of  Christ, 
a  faith  which  Paul  also  shared.  The  faith  in  the 
Parousia  of  Christ  and  the  reaction  against  the 


1  Der  Montanismus  und  die  Christliche  Kirche  des  zweiten  Jahr- 
hunderts,  Tiib.,  1841. 

2  Geschichte  des  ChrisUichen  Kirche,  3  Aufl.  1863,  vol.  i,  p.  235. 


The  Montanist  Crisis  63 

world  view  which  had  already  departed  from  this 
faith  are  the  two  chief  elements  out  of  which  the 
origin  and  character  of  Montanism  is  to  be  ex- 
plained." Anyhow^,  Montanus  came  out  as  the 
restorer  of  the  old  paths. 

There  was  first,  then,  prophecy.  He  and  the 
prophets  and  prophetesses  associated  with  him 
broke  out  into  ecstatic  utterances  which  were 
looked  upon  as  the  immediate  communications  of 
God,  and  which  he  believed  generally,  if  not  al- 
ways, came  in  this  ecstatic  way.  In  these  the 
Spirit  speaks  in  the  first  person.  "See,  man  is  as 
a  lyre,  and  I  strike  him  as  a  plectrum.  The  man 
sleeps;  I  awake.  See,  it  is  the  Lord  who  in 
ecstasy  removes  the  hearts  of  men,  who  also 
gives  the  hearts  of  men."^  Generally  the  mes- 
sages came  in  short,  broken  sentences,  the  mo- 
mentary breaking  through  out  of  the  depths  of 
the  Spirit-filled  heart.  They  therefore  came  in- 
voluntarily, the  spirits  of  the  prophet  not  being 
subject  to  the  prophets  in  the  Pauline  sense  (1. 
Cor.  14.  32;  that  is,  the  Spirit-filled  prophet, 
though  he  may  speak  in  ecstasy,  stands  in  control 
of  his  message,  and  does  not  speak  it  forth  while 
others  are  speaking,  but  bides  his  time;  the 
Spirit  is  in  no  hurry,  but  prefers  order  to  con- 
fused and  noisy  utterances  of  truth).  The  the- 
ory of  inspiration  helped  along  this  mantle 
method  of  utterance. 


» Epiph.  48.  4. 


64  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

What  was  the  content  of  the  prophecy?  This 
will  bring  us  to  the  full  significance  of  the  move- 
ment. 

As  to  doctrine,  these  prophetic  voices  were  in 
harmony  with  the  general  teaching  of  Scripture 
and  Church.  "They  confess/'  says  Hippolytus^ 
"God  the  Father  of  all  and  the  Creator  of  all, 
just  as  the  Church  does,  and  what  the  gospel  wit- 
nesses concerning  Christ."  The  greatest  Mon- 
tanist  of  history,  and  one  of  the  greatest  men  of 
antiquity,  Tertullian,  the  presbyter  of  Carthage 
(flourished  A.  D.  200),  places  himself  on  the 
Rule  of  Faith  as  on  an  impregnable  rock,  and 
looks  upon  the  Scripture  and  dogmatic  tradition 
as  unassailable.^  While  on  the  Trinity  some  of 
the  utterances  argue  the  ordinary  teaching,  and 
others  seem  to  point  to  Monarchianism,  it  is  evi- 
dent that  this  is  simply  because  in  Asia  Minor 
the  development  had  not  cleared  itself  to  a  defi- 
nite result,  and  the  voices  echo  the  general  feel- 
ing. Montanism  had  no  independent  doctrinal 
significance,  but  simply  joined  itself  consciously 
or  unconsciously  in  the  regular  course  of  doc- 
trinal development.  In  this  respect  it  was 
exactly  similar  to  Methodism,  which  came  out 
not  as  an  innovation  on  any  of  the  doctrines  re- 
ceived by  either  the  Church  of  England  or  the 
Nonconformist  churches,  but  by  a  more  vital  ap- 
prehension of  those  which  agreed  with  original 

» PhUosophumena  8.  19.  *  De  Virginibvs  Vdandis  I. 


The  Montanist  Crisis  65 

Christianity  to  make  them  again  a  living  power 
among  men.  As  to  Gnosticism,  the  movement 
was  against  it.  It  vindicated  the  true  body  of 
Christ,  the  reality  of  his  resurrection  and  that  of 
our  own  body.  As  to  eschatology,  it  was,  rather, 
the  emphasis  and  form  than  the  content  in  which 
it  differed  from  the  Church  teaching.  The  Mon- 
tanist prophecy  was  a  special  gracious  outpour- 
ing of  the  Spirit  which  should  pave  the  way  for 
the  end.  It  is  the  peculiar  fulfillment  of  Joel  3. 
1,  2.  There  had  been  earlier  fulfillments,  as  on 
the  day  of  Pentecost,  but  this  is  a  larger  and 
more  definite  one.  There  was  nothing  contrary 
to  regular  Church  teaching  in  all  this.  The 
Church  never  held  that  the  outpourings  at  the 
beginning  of  Christianity  excluded  later  ones, 
and  there  was  nothing  at  all  heretical  in  the 
claim  that  these  later  ones  were  more  important 
because  presaging  the  end  and  preparing  men 
for  it.  And  as  far  as  that  end  itself  was  con- 
cerned. Professor  Bonwetsch  expresses  the  exact 
truth  when  he  says^  that  the  "end  of  the  world 
by  the  near  advent  of  Christ  was  the  universal 
Church  faith.  We  meet  it  often  enough,  for  ex- 
ample, in  a  churchman  like  Cyprian."  And 
though  no  prophecy  of  the  ^Montanists  depicted 
the  second  coming  in  the  special  form  of  chiliasm 
(the  thousand-year  reign  of  Christ  on  earth  with 
his  saints ) ,  yet  if  it  had,  it  would  have  been  noth- 

•  In  his  important  Geschichte  des  Montanismus,  Erlangen,  1881,  p.  77. 


66  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

ing  peculiar,  for  eminent  Christians  like  Justin 
and  Tertullian  were  perfectly  at  home  in  that 
idea.  The  Montanists  did  indeed  prophesy  the 
coming  down  of  the  kingdom  on  Mount  Pepuza, 
but  their  main  thought  was  the  general  Christian 
one,  namely,  the  ultimate  glorification  of  man  in 
body  and  soul  in  the  presence  of  God. 

It  was  in  the  realm  of  discipline  perhaps  that 
the  Montanist  movement  met  the  most  decisive 
opposition.  Here  the  intention  was  simply  to 
carry  through  the  logical  consequences  of  its 
theology.  If  Christ  is  soon  to  appear,  then  cer- 
tainly it  becomes  Christians  to  watch  and  be 
sober,  to  deny  themselves,  and  to  take  up  their 
cross  daily  and  follow  Jesus.  The  methods  of  this 
cross-bearing  were  in  the  atmosphere  of  the  time, 
and  partially  suggested  by  what  I  have  spoken  of 
above  (p.  40)  as  an  ascetic  strain  in  Christianity 
itself.  But  in  Montanism  they  were  relentlessly 
laid  down  as  indispensable  conditions  of  the  spir- 
itual life,  the  true  preparation  for  the  Parousia. 
There  must  be  no  truckling  with  the  world,  no 
half  measures,  but  the  world  must  be  cast  out 
and  crucified. 

First,  in  regard  to  marriage.  It  is  a  fact  that 
Montanism  had  a  view  of  marriage  heathen  and 
not  Christian.  That  marriage  and  all  that  is 
legitimately  connected  with  it  is  not  only  per- 
missible but  honorable,  as  much  so  in  its  sphere 
as  prayer  and  worship,  is  fundamental  in  Chris- 


The  Montanist  Crisis  67 

tianity  (1  Cor.  9.  5;  Heb.  13.  4).  According  to 
this,  a  virtuous  married  life  is  just  as  high  a  state 
in  God's  sight  as  virginity.  This  principle  was 
rejected  by  the  Montanists,  as  it  soon  came  to 
be  rejected  by  the  Church.  They  explicitly  re- 
jected only  a  second  marriage,  but  that  re- 
jection, like  the  Church's  for  ministers,  was 
founded  on  a  view  of  the  physical  side  of  the  mar- 
riage relation  absolutely  heathen.  "You  cannot 
have  a  perfect  Christianity  there,''  they  said. 
The  prophetess  Prisca  praised  the  Montanists  as 
the  Virgin.^  Sexual  purity  (that  is,  abstinence) 
is  the  most  important  condition  for  the  reception 
of  the  Spirit,  for  only  a  holy  servant  can  serve 
with  holiness.^  Of  course  men  are  permitted  to 
marry,  but  this  only  on  account  of  human  weak- 
ness :  a  human  ordinance,  not  as  a  divine  pre- 
scription, an  affair  not  of  the  authority  of  the 
Lord,  but  of  human  valuation  or  determination.^ 
Perfect  virginity  is  the  ideal.^  Marriage  is  a 
kind  of  whoredom,  only  law  makes  the  differ- 
ence.^ Tertullian  did,  indeed,  at  one  time  see 
the  matter  rightly.^  But  he  came  to  feel  with  his 
brother  Montanists  that  the  further  leading  of 
the  Spirit  had  brought  the  Church  to  the  point 
where,  with  the  impending  end,  a  more  searching 

1  Eusebiug,  Hist.  Eccl,  5.  18,  3. 

2  Tertullian,  De  Exhortatione  Castitatis,  10. 

•  Tertullian,  De  Monoqamia,  3. 

*  De  Exhortatione  Castitatis,  3,  4;  De  Monogamia,  3. 

5  De  Exhortatione  Castitatis,  9.  •  De  Anima,  27. 


68  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

ethic  was  on  the  conscience.  This  was  not  in- 
tended as  a  dogmatic  rejection  of  marriage,  for 
Montanism  did  not  wish  here  to  leave  the  ground 
of  the  Church.  The  heathen  element  which  it 
emphasized — not,  of  course,  as  heathen,  but  in 
the  highest  Christian  interest — was  really  a  part 
of  the  Church  and  soon  came  to  be  emphatically 
so,  as  we  see  in  monasticism,  which  was  already 
in  the  air,  and  in  the  great  saint  and  scholar 
Jerome.  Nor  did  Montanism  try  to  carry  out 
the  full  logical  result  of  its  principles,  but  only 
to  make  real  the  forms  of  piety  and  moral  ideals 
already  in  the  Church.  At  the  bottom  the  Mon- 
tanist  and  the  general  Church  ideas  of  marriage 
were  the  same.  Both  Montanism  and  the  Church 
had  in  principle  introduced — the  one  for  all  ear- 
nest believers,  the  other  for  the  clergy — a  new 
law  and  theory  of  Christianity. 

The  Montanists  had  also  regular  fast  days  in 
addition  to  those  of  the  Church,  and  those  of  the 
latter  they  made  more  strict  and  binding.  Be- 
sides these  thev  had  two  weeks  of  half  fast 
(xerophagia) ,  in  which  they  abstained  from 
meat,  broth,  soft  fruits,  wine,  and  from  the  bath. 

In  regard  to  other  matters,  the  Montanists 
sharpened  Church  customs.  Women,  including 
virgins,  attended  divine  service  veiled,  as  in 
Greek  lands.  Therefore  there  was  no  necessity 
for  any  ordinance  on  that  subject  in  Asia  Minor. 
In  Africa,  however,  only  married  women  went 


The  Montanist  Crisis  69 

veiled,  a  fact  which  gave  occasion  for  the  demand 
for  the  veiling  of  virgins,  for  which  Tertullian 
speaks  in  his  De  Virginihus  Velandis,  On  the 
crowning  of  soldiers  the  Montanists,  as  might  be 
expected,  took  a  negative  attitude,  in  this  having 
on  their  side  the  tradition  of  the  Church.  Mar- 
tyrdom must  not  be  avoided  by  flight.  Church 
discipline  must  be  kept  taut.  As  a  rule,  in  the 
Church  the  three  great  sins  of  murder,  apostasy, 
and  fornication  were  not  forgiven ;  that  is,  those 
guilty  were  not  taken  in  again,  but  placed  in  life- 
long penitence  and  commended  to  the  mercy  of 
God.  But  exceptions  were  made,  especially  by 
the  intercession  of  martyrs.  Montanism  in  Asia 
Minor  discouraged  readmittance,  except  at  the 
word  of  the  prophet,  and  except,  probably,  in  the 
case  of  minor  sins.  In  Africa  the  Montanists 
roundly  denied  any  possibility  of  Church  for- 
giveness for  mortal  sins.  This  forgiveness  must 
be  left  to  God.i 

Did  Montanism  have  any  trouble  with  the 
polity  of  the  Church,  especially  with  the  develop- 
ment of  the  episcopate?  Did  it  hark  back  to 
the  simpler,  nonepiscopal  forms  of  early  times? 
Only  indirectly  and  through  its  emphasis  on  the 
prophets.  What  it  wanted  was  a  moral  and  spir- 
itual reformation  on  the  lines  of  the  earlier  time 
as  interpreted  to  living  men  by  the  living  Spirit, 
and  it  was  not  concerned,  in  the  first  place,  with 

1  See  Tertullian,  De  Pudicitia,  and  Bonwetsch,  pp.  112-118. 


70  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

organization.  But  a  spiritual  conception  of  the 
Church  is  always  unfavorable  to  the  episcopal 
or  hierarchical,  as  it  exalts  the  first-hand  rela- 
tion of  the  believer  to  God.  For  that  reason 
Churches  that  have  been  great  religious  forces 
have  been  more  or  less  democratic,  either  in 
spirit  or  in  form  or  in  both.  So  it  was  with  the 
Montanist  movement.  It  said  that  the  nature  of 
the  Church  is  not  determined  by  grace  mediated 
by  officials  (the  Catholic  view),  but  that  grace 
comes  through  the  piety  of  the  members  who  re- 
ceive prophetic  leading;  and  the  government  of 
the  Church  does  not  stand  in  the  hands  of  the 
officials,  such  as  bishops,  but,  rather,  in  those 
whom  the  Spirit  freely  uses  as  the  organs  of  his 
inspiration.  One  could  be  a  bishop  and  only  a 
psychic,  and  so  unworthy  of  a  decisive  voice  in 
the  religious  affairs  of  the  Church ;  only  the  pneu- 
matics in  the  special  sense,  that  is,  the  prophets, 
are  the  qualified  possessors  of  the  powers  of  the 
keys.  Besides,  it  is  the  inevitable  tendency  of 
officialism  to  broaden  the  Church  morally,  to 
make  it  more  liberal,  more  lax  in  regard  to  sin- 
ners in  the  fold — especially  rich  sinners — and  to 
accommodate  the  Church  to  the  spirit  of  the 
times  for  the  sake  of  enlarging  its  infiuence. 
That  is  what  the  bishops  did  about  A.  D.  150. 
Montanism  was  opposed  to  that  through  and 
through.  It  is  only  the  Spirit-filled  men  in  the 
Church  who  have  the  right  to  look  after  all  mat- 


The  Montanist  Crisis  71 

ters  of  supreme  religious  importance.  Only  the 
men  who  are  receiving  the  larger  revelations 
which  the  Spirit  is  giving  to-day  before  the  end 
comes — only  these  have  the  powers  of  the  keys. 
Montanism  was  not  interested  in  throwing  over- 
board the  episcopate  as  such ;  only  indirectly  did 
it  work  against  it.  In  this  respect  the  early  his- 
tory of  Methodism  much  resembled  it  in  its  atti- 
tude toward  the  polity  of  the  Church  of  England. 
Finally,  the  question  comes:  Did  the  Church 
do  well  to  fight  Montanism  and  cast  it  out? 
Should  the  Church  have  hailed  the  Montanist 
crisis  as  a  providential  deliverance  from  her  in- 
creasing worldliness,  joined  with  it,  and  guided 
it  to  beneficent  spiritual  results  for  herself?  We 
naturally  sympathize  with  the  religious  earnest- 
ness of  the  Montanist  prophets,  and  their  uncom- 
promising attitude  of  opposition  to  every  appear- 
ance of  evil.  However  it  may  have  been  in 
Montanus^s  day,  whoever  has  read  the  writings 
of  Tertullian  and  Cyprian  knows  that  the  Church 
was  sadly  in  need  of  a  radical  reformation.^  But 
for  all  that,  I  must  feel  that  the  Church  was 
guided  by  a  true  instinct  in  rejecting  the  "New 
Prophecy,"  the  success  of  which  in  the  long  run 
would  probably  have  been  more  disastrous  than 
the  progressive  Catholicizing  of  the  Church.  For, 
first,  the  Church  was  wise  in  holding  herself 
open  to  a  new  light  on  the  second  coming  of 

1  See,  for  instance,  chapter  v  of  my  Cyprian,  1906,  pp.  47-67. 


72  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

Christ.  The  assembly  of  the  saints  at  Pepuza 
to  receive  the  Lord  is  not  in  God's  order.  There 
is  nothing  for  mankind  in  that.  Perhaps  the 
Church  was  illogical  in  refusing  to  go  to  Pepuza, 
but  she  was  really  following  the  better  light 
(John  4.  21,  23).  The  only  true  preparation  for 
the  coming  is  doing  one's  daily  tasks  in  the  spirit 
of  the  Coming  One.  The  first  Church  had  mis- 
understood not  the  fact  but  the  time  and  method 
of  the  coming,  and  history — that  is,  God — was 
now  teaching  her  a  larger  lesson.  To  go  to 
Pepuza  would  be  to  turn  back  the  hands  on  the 
clock  of  God's  providence. 

Nor  was  the  Church  in  error  in  not  heeding 
the  prophetic  voices  of  Montanus,  Prisca,  and 
Maximilla.  Prophecy  was  a  thoroughly  Chris- 
tian institution,  as  we  have  seen,  and  the  Mon- 
tanists  were  orthodox  in  emphasizing  it.  But 
here,  again,  history  was  leading  the  Church  to 
other  paths.  The  Church  had  the  Old  Testa- 
ment ;  she  had  here  and  there  many  books  of  the 
New  Testament  (I  do  not  here  refer  to  any  doc- 
trine of  the  canon)  ;  and  it  was  divine  guidance 
which  was  bringing  believers  more  and  more  face 
to  face  with  the  written  Word,  and  leaving  in  the 
background  the  immediate  revelations  of  the 
prophets.  In  that  way  the  Spirit  testifies  of  the 
Christ,  and  to  have  him  brought  home  to  man  is 
worth  all  the  revelations  in  the  world.  Besides, 
two   facts   made  the   Montanist  prophecy   sus- 


The  Montanist  Crisis  73 

pected:   (1)   Its  ecstatic  character.     As  I  have 
said,  this  was  a  common  characteristic  of  Chris- 
tian prophecy;  the  Montanists  in  this  respect 
were  not  innovators.    But  they  emphasized  this 
character  as  a  special  mark  of  genuine  revela- 
tion, and  it  is  evident  that  that  special  form  of 
prophecy  was  disappearing.    And  it  was  in  the 
divine  plan  that  it  should  disappear,  the  sooner 
the  better.    (2)  The  Montanist  prophecy  claimed 
to  be  a  higher  revelation  than  the  New  Testa- 
ment, not  different,  nor  a  substitute  for  it  (ex- 
cept where  it  contradicted  it),^  but  growing  out 
of  it,  climaxing  it,  and  really  a  grander  and  fuller 
message.     Montanism,  as  I  have  said,  was  en- 
tirely in  harmony  with  the  Kule  of  Faith,  was  in 
perfect  alignment  with  the  belief  of  the  Church,^ 
but  also  claimed  to  be  a  more  perfect  revelation 
than  any  heretofore  granted.    Ritschl,  who  gave 
a  penetrating  and  on  the  whole  just  estimate  of 
the  Montanist  movement  in  one  of  the  great  books 
of   modern   times,    says^    that   the   "Montanists 
assert  that  they  have  in  the  New  Prophecy  re- 
ceived a  revelation  of  God  through  the  Spirit, 
which,  in  that  it  is  distinguished  from  the  revela- 
tion in  Christ  and  under  certain  circumstances 
is  set  over  against  it,  makes  a  claim  to  a  higher 
validity  than  that  which  Christians   generally 

1  Tertullian,  De  Exhortatione  Castitatis,  6. 

2  De  Virginibus  Velandis,  1 ;  De  Monogamia,  2. 

»  Die  Enstehung  der  Altkatholischen  Kirche,  2  Aufl.,  1857,  p.  462. 


74  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

have  hitherto  thought  to  be  the  highest.''  It  is 
the  highest  step  to  which  revelation  has  yet  at- 
tained, and  as  such  is,  of  course,  binding  on  all. 
So  the  new  disciplinary  decrees  which  the  Spirit 
sanctions  are  the  ripe  fruit  designed  for  the  per- 
fection of  the  Church.  It  is  evident  from  this 
how  different  is  Montanism  from  Methodism, 
whose  glory  it  was  to  proclaim  original  Chris- 
tianity in  all  its  essential  and  spiritual  elements, 
and  even  from  Quakerism,  which  never  placed 
the  inner  voice  above  the  Word.  And  inasmuch 
as  the  content  of  the  New  Prophecy  did  not  show 
itself  to  be  superior  to  the  revelation  of  Christ,  I 
cannot  but  feel  that  it  was  a  healthy  instinct 
which  finally  rejected  it,  however  much  we  sym- 
pathize with  its  moral  enthusiasm  and  its  mar- 
velous faith. 

It  is  of  the  essence  of  Christianity  that  it  is  a 
progressive  religion.  That  does  not  mean  that  it 
progresses  away  from  the  truth,  but  with  the 
truth  and  in  the  truth  to  ever  larger  truth,  and  to 
new  forms  of  life  and  achievement.  Nor  does  it 
mean  that  it  gets  away  from  the  historic  facts 
(the  incarnation,  the  bodily  resurrection  of 
Christ,  etc.)  into  a  realm  of  dreams  and  specula- 
tions, but,  rooted  in  the  facts,  it  grows  ever 
larger  in  the  thoughts  and  reasonings  of  men. 
Montanism  denied  that  fundamental  fact  in 
Christianity — progress^ — and  so  died  as  it  de- 
served to  die.    Purer  than  the  Church,  it  yet  had 


The  Montanist  Crisis  75 

less  promise  for  the  future  than  the  Church, 
which,  though  morally  and  doctrinally  corrupt, 
in  its  devotion  to  Christ  and  the  apostles  had  the 
earnest  of  a  better  day,  the  seeds  of  a  new  and 
grander  life. 


CHAPTER  V 

The  Monarchian  Crisis  :  or,  Who  is  Jesus 

Christ? 

The  fact  that  in  Christ  believers  had  a  divine 
Saviour  and  Lord  rested  in  the  general  conscious- 
ness of  the  early  Church,  but  how  to  relate  him 
to  the  supreme  and  only  God,  to  God  the  Father, 
was  not  thought  through.  Was  he  from  eternity 
a  part  of  the  essence  of  God?  If  so,  in  what 
sense?  Was  he  a  cosmical  Spirit  who  in  eter- 
nity came  out  from  the  being  of  God?  Was  he 
the  Logos,  or  Word,  or  hypostatic  so-called  "per- 
sonal" principle  of  expression  or  creation  or  re- 
demption, of  communication,  of  light,  of  truth,  of 
love,  etc.?  Or  was  he  God  himself  in  another 
mode,  the  Eternal  Father  in  human  form,  in  re- 
demptional  manifestation?  Was  he  a  heavenly 
created  Being  who  was  incarnated  and  endowed 
with  the  Divine  Spirit  for  his  work?  Or,  finally, 
was  he  a  man  simply,  whether  born  miraculously 
or  not,  who  received  a  wonderful  endowment 
from  God,  either  at  his  birth  or  at  his  baptism? 
The  reader  will  notice  that  the  thought  behind 
all  these  questions  is  that  of  some  mysterious 
actual  divinitv,  in  the  case  of  some  of  them  of  a 
substantial  identity  with  God,  of  others  of  the 
supreme  God  himself,  and  of  others  of  a  moral 

76 


The  Monarchian  Crisis  77 

elevation  to  God  or  interpenetration  with  God. 
In  all  cases  a  kind  of  divinity  is  preserved.  The 
modern  notion  of  Christ  as  only  a  finely  endowed 
spiritual  teacher  of  beautiful  and  lofty  character, 
a  kind  of  better  Wesley,  a  notion  which  springs 
from  the  modern  prejudice  to  the  supernatural, 
did  not  exist  in  the  old  Church. 

An  eminent  historian  of  the  liberal  school  in- 
troduces Monarchianism  in  this  way.  The  prob- 
lem of  Christianity  is  the  Person  of  its  Founder. 
It  was  a  common  conviction  among  the  early 
Christians  that  in  him  there  was  a  perfect  reve- 
lation of  God,  and  that  one  must  think  of 
him  as  one  thinks  of  God,^  though  as  to  his 
actual  relation  to  God  and  man  there  was 
more  or  less  wavering.  Some  teachers,  such 
as  Bishop  Ignatius  of  Antioch  (about  A.  D.  110), 
simply  set  God  and  Christ  in  one,  without  mean- 
ing to  deny  the  real  humanity  of  Jesus;  others 
taught  that  in  him  a  preexistent  heavenly  Being 
(a  God,  or  Divine  Spirit,  or  Word)  had  come 
in  the  flesh  f  others  that  he  was  a  man  in  whom 
God  through  his  holy  Christ  Spirit  had  taken  his 
abode  and  could  thus  be  worshiped.^  The  second 
view  came  out  victorious  because  it  was  in  har- 
mony with  the  rising  philosophic  Logos  (Word) 
idea.     The  Apologists,  the  antignostic  theolo- 


1  cjf  TripL  Qeov,   Ancient  Homily  =  "2   Clem."      Compare   Pliny's 
quasi  deo,  Epistle  10.  96  (97).  a  Ancient  Homily. 

3  So  this  historian  interprets  Hennas  (A.  D.  150). 


78  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

gians,  and  the  Alexandrians  share  in  different 
degrees  the  idea  of  a  divine  self-unfolding  in 
which  the  Logos  is  thought  of  as  a  second  potency 
or  hypostasis  ( "person" )  gone  out  from  God  and 
subordinated  to  him.  This  idea  was  the  first 
common  achievement  of  Christian  thinkers.  But 
anwng  the  simple  ones  it  was  looked  upon  with 
suspicion,  because  they  were  afraid  that  it  was 
too  high  strung  philosophically,  and  would  en- 
danger faith  in  one  God,  in  whom,  as  taught  in 
the  Rule  of  Faith,  all  believed.  "We  hold  a 
monarchy  [one  only  supreme  Deity],"  they  said.^ 
Other  attempts  were  made  to  solve  the  Person  ot 
Christ  by  avoiding  anything  that  looked  like 
ditheism,  some  of  them  by  lessening  the  deity  of 
Christ,  others  by  lessening  his  humanity;  and 
both  classes  of  attempts  were  called  Monarchian- 
ism,  though  originally  the  name  was  used  only 
of  the  second.^ 

It  is  a  favorite  contention  of  so-called  liberal 
scholars  that  the  belief  in  the  divinity  of  Christ, 
based  on  the  Trinitarian  conception  of  God,  arose 
from  borrowing  Jewish  theophanies,  or  God- 
manifestations,  and  philosophical  ideas  of  the 
Greeks,  and  clothing  them  with  Christian  dress; 
and  that  the  spring  of  the  Monarchian  movement 
was  in  part  a  reaction  against  such  high-flown 
notions  in  favor  of  a  simpler  faith.    Thus  Har- 

*  TertuUian,  Adversus  Praxeam,  3. 

«  Von  Schubert  in  his  edition  of  MoUer,  KG.,  1892,  p.  268f. 


The  Monarchian  Crisis  79 

nack  says/  that  the  above  belief  corresponded  to 
the  explanation  of  the  Old  Testament  theoph- 
anies,   which   was  taken   over   by   the   Alexan- 
drian fathers,  and  which  proved  so  effective  in 
apologetical  use.    The  Christian  Son-of-God  doc- 
trine could  be  most  easily  accepted  by  educated 
heathen  in  the  shape  of  the  Logos  doctrine.    See 
the  notable  confession  of  Celsus  2.  31 :  "If  really, 
according  to  your  teaching,  the  Word  is  the  Son 
of  God,  then  we  agree  with  you."     This  belief 
in  the  divinity  of  Christ  is  supported  by  the  wit- 
ness of  Paul  and  by  a  row  of  primitive  writings 
whose  authority  w^as  becoming  more  and  more 
absolute,  and — what  is  not  the  least — it  could 
with  little  pains  be  classified  in  the  same  order 
with  the  cosmological  and  theological  principles 
w^hich  as  the  foundation  for  a  rational  Christian 
theology  had  been  borrowed  from  the  religious 
philosophy  of  the  time.     Where  belief  in   the 
divine  Logos  for  explanation  of  the  origin  and 
history  of  the  world  was  taken  up,  there  it  was 
already  decided  by  what  means  the  divine  honors 
and  the  sonship  of  God  of  the  Redeemer  are  alone 
to  be  determined.     In  this  way  the  theologians 
have  nothing  at  all  to  fear  for  their  monotheism. 
For  the  eternal   Substance  lying  back  of  the 
world — so  they  thought  of  the  Deity — can  repre- 


1  In  his  elaborate  article  on  Monarchianism  (pp.  33)  in  the  third 
edition  of  the  Herzog  Realencyklopadie  (edited  by  Hauck),  vol. 
xiii  (1903),  pp.  305,  306. 


80  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

sent  and  unfold  himself  in  different  subjects.    He 
can  communicate  his  peculiar  uncreated  being  to 
different  bearers,  without  being  emptied  or  in 
his  being  divided.     Finally,  the  theologians  had 
nothing  to  fear  for  the  "deity"  of  Christ,  in  whom 
the  incarnation  of  that  Logos  was  to  be  seen. 
For  the  conception  of  the  Logos  was  capable  of 
being  filled  with  the  most  manifold  content,  and 
for  its  skillful  treatment  there  was  the  most 
abundant  preparation.     This  conception  could 
fit  every  change  and  increase  of  religious  in- 
terest, every  deepening  of  speculation,  as  well  as 
every  need  of  worship — yes,  even  the  new  re- 
sults of  biblical  exegesis.     Step  by  step  it  re- 
vealed itself  as  the  most  convenient  variable, 
which  could  be  immediately  determined  by  every 
new  quantity  which  was  taken  up  in  theological 
advance.     In  fact,  it  came  to  have  a  content 
which   was  in   the  sharpest   opposition   to   the 
thoughts    out    of    which    the    conception    itself 
sprang,   that  is,  a  content  which  almost  com- 
pletely hid  the  cosmological  origin  of  the  con- 
ception.     But   it   lasted    long,    until    this    was 
reached.     As  long  as  the  Logos  was  used  as  a 
formula  under  which  one  conceived  it  as  the 
original  pattern  of  the  world  or  as  the  reasonable 
world  law,  so  long  there  did  not  entirely  cease  a 
mistrust  of  the  propriety  of  the  conception  for 
fixing  the  deity  of  Christ.    For  it  was  the  deity 
itself  in  the  Redeemer  which  the  pious  wished  to 


The  Monarchian  Crisis  81 

see,  and  nothing  less.  Athanasius  was  the  first 
who  made  that  possible  for  them  by  his  interpre- 
tation of  the  formula  of  the  Logos,  but,  at  the 
same  time,  if  he  did  not  bring  the  whole  concep- 
tion to  naught,  he  really  placed  it  in  the  back- 
ground (that  is,  he  shelved  the  ideas  that  con- 
nected the  Logos  with  the  world  creation,  etc., 
for  those  which  connected  it  with  the  redemption 
and  the  Redeemer).  And  the  history  of  Chris- 
tology  from  Athanasius  to  Augustine  is  the  his- 
tory of  the  substitution  of  the  conception  of  the 
Son  (as  the  "other  I"  of  God)  for  that  of  the 
Logos,  which,  of  course,  still  bore  many  traits 
of  the  old  Logos  conception.  Thus  the  explana- 
tions of  Harnack. 

All  this  is  most  interesting  and  there  is 
enough  truth  in  it  to  make  it  plausible.  But  two 
or  three  other  things  might  be  said:  (1)  It  ought 
not  to  be  anything  against  a  Christian  truth — in 
this  case  the  deity  of  Christ  as  the  Word  or  Ex- 
pression or  Communicating  Love  and  Power  or 
Mediator  or  World-side,  of  God,  in  eternal  hypo- 
static union  and  communion  with  him,  the  con- 
ception of  God  as  a  Complex,  as  a  manifold  Life 
instead  of  a  bare  unit  (Mohammedanism) — that 
it  fitted  in  with  the  highest  thoughts  of  Jew  and 
pagan,  was  prepared  for  by  them,  and  was  the 
completion  and  flowering  out  of  their  best  con- 
ceptions. The  kinship  of  this  truth  with  the 
highest  reaches  of  Jewish  or  pagan  philosophy 


82  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

should,  rather,  commend  it  to  those  who  look 
upon  God  as  the  inspirer  and  teacher  of  all  his 
children.  (2)  But  this  truth  was  not  borrowed 
from  Jew  or  Greek.  It  w^as  part  of  the  original 
consciousness  of  the  Church,  borne  in  upon  be- 
lievers by  their  Christian  experience,  by  the  lead- 
ing of  the  Spirit,  who,  it  will  not  be  denied,  took 
of  the  things  of  Christ  and  revealed  them  unto 
them,  and  by  their  daily  walk  with  Christ.  It 
was,  indeed,  enlarged  and  deepened  on  the  in- 
tellectual and  literary  side  by  the  Old  Testament, 
by  the  later  Jewish  Alexandrian  teachers,  by  the 
best  things  that  Greek  philosophy  had  to  offer; 
but  all  this  had  only  to  do  with  the  form,  the 
unfolding,  the  apologetic  statement,  the  theolog- 
ical shaping,  not  with  the  content  or  essence  of 
the  doctrine.  "All  the  truth  that  you  have  in 
your  impersonal  Logos,  or  personified  Wisdom  or 
Power,  etc.,"  said  apostles  and  others,  "we  have 
in  Christ,  the  true  Word,  the  true  Revelation  and 
Life  of  God."  (3)  The  conception  of  Christ 
which  believers  had  was  not  that  he  had  received 
something  from  the  Substance  that  lies  back  of 
the  World,  as  this  Substance  unfolds  himself  or 
itself  to  different  individuals,  but  that  he  was 
himself  the  peculiar  and  only  begotten  Son  of 
God.  (4)  Their  conception  of  Christ  as  the 
Word  did  not  spring  from  cosmological  specula- 
tions but  from  the  conviction — was  it  not  in- 
spired by  the  Spirit? — that  he  who  was  their  life 


The  Monarchian  Crisis  83 

was  also  the  life  of  the  universe,  and  he  who  made 
them  made  the  world.  (5)  It  was  not  a  trans- 
formation or  bringing  to  naught  of  the  original 
doctrine  of  the  deity  of  Christ  (the  Word,  etc.) 
that,  as  it  is  alleged,  it  went  forward  from  a  cos- 
mological  to  a  redemptional  reference.  Both 
existed  either  implicitly  or  explicitly  in  the  finest 
and  devoutest  souls.  One  was  only  the  reverse 
or  deeper  side  of  the  other.  At  the  same  time  it 
is  interesting  to  note  that  Harnack  acknowledges 
that  the  truth  of  the  deity  of  Jesus  went  back  to 
Paul,  the  first  literary  champion  of  Christianity, 
who  claims  to  have  received  his  gospel  direct 
from  Christ,  and  that  it  went  back  to  the  early 
Christian  witnesses,  whose  writings  were  ever 
being  invested  with  absolute  authority  in  the 
Church.  He  also  acknowledges  that  the  doctrine 
was  the  deepest,  the  worthiest,  the  most  satisfy- 
ing to  religious  feeling  and  needs,  the  most  mani- 
fold in  its  response  to  the  growing  life  of  Chris- 
tian men,  and  the  most  fitting  to  meet  the  search- 
ings  and  speculations  of  Christian  thinkers;  the 
doctrine  which  filled  most  truly  the  devotions 
and  worship  of  Christian  saints,  as  well  as  every 
advancing  knowledge  of  the  Bible.  And  with 
every  advance  in  Christian  theology  that  doctrine 
was  not  only  not  outgrown,  but  it  was  there  to 
make  the  advance  fruitful  for  life  and  for  death, 
for  comfort  and  for  light,  for  salvation  and  for 
immortality. 


84  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

Loofs,  who  belongs  to  the  same  general  school 
as  Harnack,  to  whom  he  dedicates  his  book,  ac- 
knowledges^ that  a  Trinitarian  conception  goes 
back  to  the  New  Testament,  a  conception  which 
saw  in  the  historical  Christ  and  in  the  Holy 
Spirit  an  "economicaP'  unfolding  of  the  self-re- 
vealing God,  and,  indeed,  so  that  the  Logos  ap- 
pearing in  the  Christ,  although  as  Spirit  one  with 
God,  was  before  ages  (aeons)  to  be  distinguished 
from  him,  while  the  Spirit  of  God  or  of  Christ  in 
an  analogous  way  was  looked  upon  as  a  third 
revelation  of  God  which  first  went  out  from  the 
historical  Christ  (John  20.  22)  and  is  working  in 
the  Church.  I  do  not  ask  whether  this  covers  the 
New  Testament  doctrine,  but  it  is  interesting  as 
a  statement  of  an  eminent  scholar  of  the  right 
Ritschlian  wing  that  that  doctrine  is  a  Trinita- 
rian one. 

It  was  the  noble  aim  of  the  Monarchians  to 
prove  at  all  hazards  the  truth  of  one  God,  while, 
at  the  same  time,  guarding  in  some  form  the 
divinity  of  Jesus.  First,  a  word  as  to  what  are 
called  dynamistic  {SvvaiiLg,  power)  Monarchians. 
These  start  from  the  historical  human  person  of 
Jesus;  but,  knowing  that  Christ  was  more  than 
a  man,  they  guarantee  the  divinity  in  him  by 
asserting  an  indwelling  power  of  God.  Among 
these  are  to  be  counted  the  Alogi,  a  little  com- 
pany of  people  in  Asia  Minor,  the  Boston  of  the 

1  Dogmengeschichte,  4  Aufl.,  1906,  pp.  137,  138. 


The  Monarchian  Crisis  85 

ancient  Church,  where  all  kinds  of  ideas  were 
moving  and  fermenting,  who  seem  to  have  been 
called  out  by  a  reaction  from  the  Montanist  em- 
phasis on  the  Spirit,  with  the  various  crude  ideas 
which  were  connected  with  that  emphasis,  which 
was  founded  partly  on  John's  Gospel.  They 
therefore  threw  overboard  that  Gospel  and  the 
Logos  (Word)  Christology  which  it  proclaimed. 
They  were  the  first  rationalistic  critics  of  the 
New  Testament,  calling  attention  to  the  differ- 
ences between  John's  and  other  Gospels,  and  on 
the  strength  of  these  differences,  and  of  the  doc- 
trine of  the  person  of  Christ  contained  in  the 
former  (though  at  bottom  no  different  from  the 
others),  rejecting  it.  How  thoroughly  out  of 
accord  they  were  with  the  Christian  current  is 
seen  by  their  utter  repudiation  of  the  Montanists 
as  an  unchristian  party.  More  important  was 
Theodotus,  the  learned  leather-maker,  who 
about  A.  D.  190  came  from  Byzantium  to  Rome. 
Epiphanius  calls  him  (54.  1)  a  "torn-off  rag  of 
the  Alogi  heresy,"  who  taught  that  Jesus  was  a 
man,  who  by  the  divine  decree  was  born  of  the 
Holy  Spirit  from  a  virgin,  and  upon  this  most 
pious  and  just  man  the  Spirit  came  down  at  the 
baptism  in  the  Jordan.  This  Spirit  which  thus 
came  down  and  entered  into  Jesus  is  called  the 
Son  of  God,  or  Christ.  In  consequence  of  this 
endowment,  or  kind  of  post-natal  incarnation, 
Jesus  did  his  miracles.    However,  it  is  not  to  be 


86  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

called  an  incarnation  properly,  and  this  Jesus 
Christ  is  not  to  be  called  God,  or  at  the  most,  as 
some  said,  only  after  the  resurrection.  Although 
these  men  seemed  to  have  in  other  matters  the 
general  faith  of  the  Church,  and  held  to  the  com- 
mon books  of  the  New  Testament,  including 
John,  and  entertained  ideas  on  Christ  which 
some  think  not  far  from  those  of  Hermas,  whose 
book  enjoyed  great  favor  in  Church  circles,  yet 
they  were  excluded  from  Church  fellowship — at 
least  Theodotus  was^ — by  Victor,  bishop  of  Rome 
(A.  D.  190ff.),  because  they  made  Christ  a 
iptXdg  dvdgcjTTog  a  mere  man.  This  charge  was  fair 
as  to  Christ's  origin,  but  w^as  not  fair  as  to  his 
later  relations  to  God,  which  were  not  at  all  that 
of  a  man.  The  later  inflow  of  the  divine  Spirit 
into  Christ  made  him  a  kind  of  God.  Under 
Bishop  Zephyrinus  (A.  D.  202ff.)  they  formed 
their  own  Church  society  in  Rome. 

The  leather-worker  of  Byzantium,  whose  fol- 
lowing was  apparently  small,  whose  idea  of  a 
human  Christ  only  later  divinely  filled  made  no 
appeal  to  the  general  Church  consciousness,  has 
had  his  sweet  revenge.  For  his  Christ  is  coming 
to  be  the  Christ  of  many  in  the  so-called  orthodox 
Churches.  So  long  as  you  hold  to  the  single  na- 
ture of  Christ — that  he  is  a  man  only  as  to  his 
origin  and  essence — then  you  can  admit  almost 
anything  desired  as  to  the  fullness  with  which 
his  beautiful  and  simple  soul  received  the  divine. 


The  Monarchian  Crisis  87 

Throw  out  the  miraculous  conception,  for  the 
modern  man,  it  is  said,  will  know  nothing  of 
the  supernatural;  throw  out  his  essential  one- 
ness with  God,  for  the  modern  man  does  not 
know  nor  care  anything  about  "metaphysics,"  for 
anything  above  historical  phenomena  and  their 
natural  causes;  but  after  that  bring  in  as  much 
of  God  to  explain  his  marvelous  personality  and 
influence  as  you  like.    This  is  the  new  Christol- 
ogy,  which  still  claims  to  guard  Christ's  divin- 
ity ;  but  it  is  as  old  as  the  leather- worker  of  the 
Bosporus  of  the  second  century.     But   it  has 
never  been  explained  w^hy  only  one  human  ever 
received  so  much  of  God  as  to  be  either  worshiped 
as  God  by  his  followers,  or  to  practically  take 
the  place  of  God  for  those  who  would  not  wish  to 
admit  that  they  worship  him.     For  Theodotus's 
Christ  as  a  common  man^  an  idea  which  Loofs 
well  says  (p.  184)  was  with  right  looked  upon  as 
contrary  to  the  tradition  received  by  the  Church, 
to  have  met  this  fate  was  a  far  greater  miracle 
than  the  Christ  received  from  the  first  in  the 
Church — the  Christ  who  was  both  man  and  the 
Son  of  God. 

The  other  class  of  Monarchians,  to  whom  prop- 
erly the  name  belonged,  were  the  modalistic 
Monarchians,  sometimes  called  the  Patripassians 
(those  who  believed  the  Father  suffered).  Here 
the  start  was  made  from  the  deity  of  Christ,  and 

>  KOivdc  ivdpcjKoc,  Hippolytus,  Philosophumena,  10.  23. 


88  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

from  that  as  a  basis  the  argument  was  made 
backward  on  the  universally  received  assump- 
tion of  only  one  God  to  the  virtual  denial  of 
Christ's  full  humanity,  that  Christ  himself  is  the 
Almighty  God  and  Father,  or  a  mode  of  him. 
This  doctrine  also  arose  in  Asia  Minor,  and  from 
there  sprang  over  to  Rome.  Apparently,  its  first 
representative  was  Noetus,  of  Smyrna,  in  the 
latter  part  of  the  second  century.  In  the  region 
of  Polycarp,  the  pupil  of  Saint  John,  where  also 
memories  of  Ignatius  were  present,  in  that  Asia 
Minor  where  the  idea  of  the  absolute  deity  of 
Christ  was  reigning,  witnessed  by  the  naive 
placing  of  Christ  and  God  in  the  same  category 
by  Ignatius  and  Irenseus,  a  placing  which  goes 
back  through  these  and  Polycarp  to  John  (Paul) 
and  to  Christ — in  that  region  it  was  easy  by  over- 
emphasizing his  divinity  to  lose  sight  of  his  abso- 
lute humanity,  guaranteed  by  the  incarnation, 
and  to  make  Christ  only  another  mode  or  form  of 
the  one  God  (the  Father).  This  Noetus  did. 
But  it  was  a  true  instinct  which  made  the  Church 
as  jealous  for  the  real  humanity  of  Christ  as  for 
his  real  divinity,  and  therefore  Noetus  was  ex- 
cluded from  fellowship  in  spite  of  his  question, 
"What  harm  do  I  glorifying  the  Christ?"  A 
follower  of  Noetus  and  an  enemy  of  the  Mon- 
tanists,  Praxeas,  went  to  Rome  and  introduced 
the  doctrine  there.  Thence  he  went  to  Car- 
thage, where,  "many  sleeping  in  the  simplicity 


The  Monarchian  Crisis  89 

of  doctrine"^    (compare  the  condition  of  many 
Christians    to-day   over    against    the    Christian 
Science    propaganda),    he    found    a    large    en- 
trance and  raised  up  against  him  the  most  power- 
ful mind  of  the  early  Church  before  Origen,  Ter- 
tullian,  who  met  him  with  arguments    (before 
A.  D.    202)     and    compelled    him    to    retract. 
Praxeas  was  a  man  of  no  small  talent,  as  in  Rome 
after  the  bishop  there  had  acknowledged  the  pro- 
phetic gifts  of  Montanus,  Prisca,  and  Maximilla, 
and  had  bestowed  his  peace  upon  the  churches  of 
Asia  and  Phrygia,  Praxeas  persuaded  him,  as  the 
Judaizers    persuaded    his    alleged    predecessor, 
Peter,  to  a  change  of  course,  to  the  deep  disgust 
of  Paul  (Gal.  2.  11-14),  to  withdraw  his  friendly 
letter  and  change  his  cordial  feeling,  besides  ap- 
parently inducing  the  bishop  to  a  favorable  atti- 
tude as  to  his  doctrine  of  Christ.     For,  as  Ter- 
tullian  says   {Adv.  Prax.,  1)   in  a  stinging  sen- 
tence, "By  this  Praxeas  did  a  twofold  service  to 
the  devil  in  Rome :  he  drove  away  prophecy  and 
brought  in  heresy ;  he  put  to  flight  the  Paraclete 
and  crucified  the  Father."    Not  only  so,  but,  ac- 
cording to  Hippolytus,  one  of  the  greatest  Church 
fathers  of  the  third  century,  not  only  this  bishop 
of  Rome   (probably  Victor),  but  also  his  suc- 
cessor, Zepyrinus  (about  A.  D.  202-218),  whom 
Hippolytus  calls — we  hope  with  exaggeration — 
"an  ignorant  and  shamefully  corrupt  man,"  and 

» Tertullian,  Adversus  Praxeam,  1. 


90  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

again  an  "ignorant  and  illiterate  person,"  be- 
came hopelessly  involved  in  the  doctrine  of 
Noetus;  and  even  more  his  successor,  Callistus 
(about  A.  D.  218),  a  thorough  knave  according 
to  Hippolytus,  was  carried  away  by  the  same 
Christology.^  It  is  not  against  these  Eoman 
Popes  that,  of  little  mental  equipment,  untrained 
in  theological  distinctions,  and  holding  firmly  to 
the  old  Church  teaching  of  the  divinity  of  Christ, 
they  should  have  been  misled  by  the  plausible  dis- 
ciples of  Noetus,  and  that  in  desiring  to  maintain 
the  deity  of  the  Saviour  they  should  have  leaned 
backward,  so  to  speak,  and  become  practically 
or  actually  Patripassians,  as  the  great  bishop 
affirms.  It  is  only  as  we  measure  them  by  the 
later  dogma  of  papal  infallibility,  first  officially 
affirmed  in  1870,  that  they  appear  incompetent 
leaders  of  the  Church,  blindly  leading  it  into 
what  came  to  be  roundly  rejected  as  heresy.  They 
were  not  to  blame  for  that  dogma,  which  is  shat- 
tered on  their  history,  that  is,  if  we  are  to  assume 
the  substantial  accuracy  of  Hippolytus. 

The  modalistic  Christology  went  a  step  farther. 
What  is  called  the  Father  and  the  Son  is  one  and 
the  same,  but  the  Son  is  not  an  arbitrary  change 
of  name,  but  expresses  the  mode  to  which  God 
determines  himself.  God  himself  makes  himself 
a  Son.  He  is  born  his  own  Son.  According  to 
the  time  he  is  either  Father  or  Son.    On  the  cross 


1  Philosophumena,  9.  2,  6,  7. 


The  Monarchian  Crisis  91 

he  gave  up  his  spirit  to  himself;  that  is,  God 
transforms  himself  into  different  modes.  If  we 
may  believe  accounts  which  are  late  (Basil, 
Athanasius),  Sabellius  was  one  of  the  principal 
men  of  this  view.  One  and  the  same  is  Father 
and  Son.  God  appears  now  as  Father,  now  as 
Son,  now  as  Holy  Spirit,  according  to  the  neces- 
sity of  the  divine  activity.  How  far  these  Per- 
sons or  appearances  or  energies  are  to  be  looked 
upon  as  the  successive  coming  forth  or  revelation 
of  the  one  God  in  the  creative,  redeeming,  and 
sanctifying  work,  cannot  be  said  with  certainty. 

Callistus,  bishop  of  Rome  A.  D.  217ff.,  though 
really  a  Patripassian,  tried  to  make  a  compro- 
mise and  bring  peace  to  the  Church.  In  holding 
to  the  sameness  of  essence  of  Father  and  Son  he 
satisfied  the  modalistic  Monarchians,  but  he 
struck  the  clever  middle  ground,  namely,  that 
the  Father  did  not  suffer,  but  only  suffered  with 
the  Son,  who  in  this  relation  is  to  be  distin- 
guished from  the  Father,  who  is  Spirit,  while  the 
Son  is  Spirit  and  flesh,  or,  briefly,  flesh.  Hip- 
polytus  says  (9.  7)  that  Callistus  "alleges  that 
the  Logos  himself  is  Son  and  himself  is  Father, 
and  though  called  by  a  different  title  he  is  in 
reality  one  indivisible  Spirit.  The  Father  is  not 
one  Person  and  the  Son  another,  but  they  are  one 
and  the  same.  All  things  are  full  of  the  divine 
Spirit.  The  Spirit  which  became  incarnate  in 
the  virgin  is  not  different  from  the  Father,  but 


92  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

one  and  the  same.    The  Father  who  subsisted  in 
(the  Son)  himself,  after  he  had  taken  to  himself 
our  flesh,  raised  it  to  the  nature  of  the  Deity, 
by  bringing  it  into  union  with  himself,  and  made 
it  one;  so  that  the  Father  and  the  Son  must  be 
styled  one  God;  and  this  Person  being  one  can- 
not be  two."     In  this  way  Callistus  contends, 
Hippolytus  goes  on  to  say,  that  the  "Father  suf- 
fered along  with  the  Son,  for  he  does  not  wish  to 
assert  that  the  Father  suffered  and  is  one  Person, 
being  careful  to  avoid  blaspheming  the  Father. 
Senseless  and  knavish  fellow,  who  improvises 
blasphemies  in  every  direction  only  that  he  may 
not  seem  to  speak  in  violation  of  the  truth  and  is 
not  abashed  at  being  at  one  time  betrayed  into 
the  tenet  of  Sabellius,  whereas  at  another  in  the 
doctrine  of  Theodotus."     It  is  evident,  what- 
ever exaggeration  and  bitterness  may  breathe 
through  the  great  orthodox  bishop's  words,  that 
his  contemporary  moral  and  theological  enemy 
Callistus  was  trying  to   carry  water  on   both 
shoulders.    Von  Schubert  well  describes  (i,  237) 
his  formula  as  an  iridescent  or  changing  color 
(scMllernde)  one,  and  neither  Sabellius  on  the 
one  hand  nor  Hippolytus  on  the  other  was  satis- 
fied with  it,  while  Tertullian  directs  a  powerful 
book  against  the  followers  of  Praxeas,  "whom  we 
may  well  understand  to  be  no  one  but  Callistus 
and  his  people."    Anyhow,  Monarchianism  in  the 
West  could  not  stand  the  onsets  of  such  trench- 


The  Monarchian  Crisis  93 

ant  pens  as  Tertullian  and  Hippolytus,  and  was 
given  a  finishing  stroke  in  the  book  on  the  Trinity 
by  Novatian,  independent  bishop  of  Rome,  A.  D. 
251.  In  the  East  the  mighty  spirit  of  Origen 
helped  to  kill  it.  But  it  may  be  that  the  facing- 
two-ways  formulas  of  the  slippery  ecclesiastical 
politician  Callistus  were  a  kind  of  bridge  for  the 
quiet  passing  over  into  the  Church  of  the  regular 
Christology,  a  doctrine  of  the  person  of  Christ 
which  saved  both  his  humanity  and  divinity, 
which  went  back  from  the  theologians  of  the  first 
part  of  the  third  century  through  Polycarp,  John, 
Paul,  to  Christ  himself.  That  preserved  the  in- 
terest the  dynamistic  Monarchians  were  jealous 
for,  the  actual  manhood  of  Jesus,  providing  for 
his  deity  in  a  secondary  way,  as  well  as  the  in- 
terest their  modalistic  brethren  felt  uppermost — • 
the  absolute  Godhead  of  Jesus. 

I  cannot  understand  the  insistence  of  Harnack 
in  making^  the  conquering  Christology  the  pro- 
duct of  the  Platonic-Stoic  philosophy,  except  in 
the  sense  that  all  truth  is  one.  Men  like  Tertul- 
lian and  Hippolytus  were  not  inclined  to  heathen 
notions  as  such.  No;  it  was  the  consciousness 
of  standing  in  the  stream  of  a  living  tradition 
that  flowed  from  the  fountain  head,  in  the  pos- 
sessing of  a  Christian  experience  that  meant  a 
divine  Redeemer,  and  face  to  face  with  authentic 

*  Realencyklopddie  fiir  protestantische  Theologie,  3  Aufl.,  vol.  xiii, 
pp.  306,  307. 


94  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

documents  that  from  the  earliest  time  bore  wit- 
ness that  Christ  had  not  only  come  in  the  flesh, 
but  that  He  who  had  come  was  the  Son  of  God ; 
and  the  Christology  that  pressed  back  Monarchi- 
anism  was  the  most  scientific,  the  most  rational, 
the  inevitable  expression  of  these  facts.    Nor  is 
Harnack  right  in  saying  that  the  history  of  the 
fight  with  Monarchianism  is  the  "history  of  the 
supplanting  of  the  historical  Christ  by  the  pre- 
existent,  of  the  living  by  the  imaginary,''  and 
that  in  doctrine  it  "is  the  victorious  attempt  to 
keep  the  Christian  faith  of  the  laity  in  leading 
strings  by  a  theological  formula  they  could  not 
understand,  and  to  set  the  mystery  of  the  person 
(of  Christ)  in  the  place  of  the  person."    Just  the 
contrary  is  the  fact.    It  was  exactly  as  the  genu- 
ine Gospels  and  Epistles  were  being  more  and 
more  scattered  and  studied,  as  the  knowledge  of 
them  was  being  more  and  more  deepened  and  en- 
larged, and  thus  the  facts  of  the  historical  Christ 
were  becoming  more  and  more  a  part  of  the  gen- 
eral knowledge,  it  was  exactly  when  this  process 
was  going  on  that  the  true  doctrine  of  Christ  as 
over  against  Theodotus  and  Noetus  was  sinking 
into  the  universal  Christian  mind.     And  would 
it  be  said  that  the  fantastic  conception  of  him  of 
Byzantium,  namely,  that  at  some  one  time  in  his 
experience  God  poured  himself  into  Jesus,   so 
that  after  that  time  he  was  divine  while  not  be- 
fore, was  a  more  living,  a  more  real,  a  more  his- 


The  Monarchian  Crisis  95 

torical  conception  than  that  of  his  opponents? 
Much  less  the  conception  of  Noetus  of  successive 
transformations  of  God  the  Father.  Did  they 
correspond  with  the  inner  experience  of  Jesus  as 
set  forth  in  the  Gospels?  I  do  not  say  that  there 
is  no  mystery  in  the  person  of  Jesus.  Every  per- 
sonality is  an  unfathomable  sea.  The  only  differ- 
ence between  the  mystery  of  the  Monarchians  and 
that  of  their  opponents  is  that  the  latter  was 
rational  and  satisfied  the  facts,  while  the  former 
was  not  and  did  not.  I  cannot  share,  therefore, 
Harnack's  sympathy  with  the  vanquished  in  this 
fight.  As  grossly  exaggerated  also  is  Harnack's 
statement  that  with  the  victory  of  the  Logos 
Christology  the  "thought  of  the  real  human  per- 
sonality of  the  Redeemer  was  condemned  as  eccle- 
siastically insufferable."  The  actual  human  per- 
sonality of  Jesus  was  fundamental  in  the  Church. 
In  fact,  that  was  one  reason  for  her  conflict  with 
both  Gnosticism  and  Monarchianism.  But  the 
Church  saw  that  such  a  real  human  person- 
ality was  not  inconsistent  with  a  preexistence  in 
essential  oneness  with  God,  but  was  guaranteed 
by  the  incarnation.  It  is  our  task  to  find  a  place 
for  all  the  facts. 

The  scheme  of  the  modalistic  Monarchians  has 
had  a  fascination  for  minds  of  varied  type.  An 
eminent  Congregational  clergyman  writes  me 
that  he  still  holds  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity, 
though  he  would  state  it  in  a  modalistic  form. 


96     .  .     Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

It  is  also  said  that  many  in  so-called  orthodox 
Churches  are  really  Sabellians.  It  is  not  the 
place  here  to  make  an  argument  in  systematic 
theology.  But  for  those  who  are  drawn  to 
Noetus  and  his  school  I  would  ask  that  they  read 
the  literature  his  views  called  out,  and  to  con- 
sider whether  there  can  be,  after  all,  any  real 
modal  Trinity  unless  it  rests  back  on  an  imma- 
nent Trinity.  But  there  can  be  many  God- 
endowed  men. 


CHAPTER  VI 

The  Chiliastic  Crisis  :  or,  Shall  Christianity 

Fulfill  Its  Mission  by  Leavening  or 

BY  Catastrophe? 

Chiliasm  (x^.lcoc,  a  thousand;  singular,  ;^;iA/a, 
used  with  collective  nouns)  is  the  name  generally 
applied  to  the  belief  in  the  thousand-year  reign 
of  Christ  in  person  on  earth,  after  which  comes 
the  end.  The  doctrine  has  assumed  large  im- 
portance in  modern  times  by  an  active  propa- 
ganda in  tracts,  pamphlets,  books,  conferences, 
conventions,  etc.,  and  the  claim  is  frequently 
made  that  this  was  the  regular  belief  of  the  whole 
Church  in  the  first  centuries.  It  is  one  aspect  of 
the  second-coming-of-Christ  doctrine,  which  has 
now  three  forms :  ( 1 )  Christ  is  never  coming  in 
person  at  all,  his  second  coming  having  been 
fulfilled  in  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem  and  of 
the  Jewish  Church-State  as  such  in  A.  D.  70,  or 
in  similar  historical  catastrophes,  and  that  his 
coming  is  really  his  Presence  {iragovGia,  Parousia) 
which  is  not  to  be  interpreted  as  a  visible  and 
external  act,  but  as  his  spiritual  working  in  the 
world.  I  think  the  first  to  set  forth  this  view 
was  the  Rev.  Dr.  Israel  P.  Warren,  editor  of  The 
Christian  Mirror,  Portland,  Maine,  an  eminent 
Congregational   minister,   in   his   The  Parousia 

97 


98    '       Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

(Portland,  1879,  second  edition,  enlarged,  1884), 
whose  view  has  able  supporters  in  the  Rev.  Dr. 
J.  Stuart  Russell,  a  brother  Congregationalist, 
in  his  The  Parousia  (London,  1887),  and  in  the 
late  Rev.  Dr.  William  S.  Urmy,  of  the  California 
Conference  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church, 
in  his  Christ  Came  Again,  New  York,  1900.    The 
fact  that  Dr.  Urmy  was  never  compelled  to  re- 
tract his  opinion  or  withdraw  his  book,  and  never 
tried  for  heresy,  has  the  significance  of  a  revolu- 
tion in  the  attitude  of  the  Methodist  Church  to- 
ward heresy.     For,  speaking  historically,  it  is 
hardly  too  much  to  say  that  the  belief  in  Christ's 
first  coming  has  not  been  more  general,  more 
firmly  held,  more  a  part  of  the  consciously  or  un- 
consciously   held   doctrinal    possessions   of   the 
Church  from  the  apostolic  times  till  now,  than  the 
belief  in  his  second  coming  at  the  end  of  the  age 
or  of  the  world   (not  simply  in  A.  D.  70)    for 
reign  or  for  judgment  or  for  both.    The  denying 
that   is   something   like   Kalthoff's   denial   that 
Christ  ever  existed.     (2)  Christ  is  coming  at  the 
end  of  the  world  to  wind  up  the  affairs  of  man- 
kind, to  judge  the  evil  and  the  good,  and  to  de- 
liver over  the  kingdom  to  God  the  Father.      (3) 
Christ  is  coming  at  the  end  of  the  first  Christian 
world-age  to  reign  in  the  world  for  a  thousand 
years  (interpreted  strictly  or  loosely),  when  his 
saints  shall  reign  with  him  in  gladness  and  peace, 
when  his  kingdom  shall  win  universal  obedience. 


The  Chiliastic  Crisis  99 

after  which  shall  come  the  end.  This  is  some- 
times called  premillennialism,  or  chiliasm, 
though  it  must  be  remembered  that  early  chil- 
iasm  must  not  be  charged  with  all  the  views  of 
later  teachers  of  the  same  trend. 

Chiliasm  is  generally  associated  with  a  belief 
in  the  visible  return  of  Christ  for  the  setting  up 
of  an  earthly  theocracy  as  the  middle  point  of  a 
perfect  world-rule  which  belongs  to  Christianity 
as  such,  and  which  is  a  preparatory  step  for  the 
other  life.  It  includes  annihilation  of  godless 
world-powers,  which  must  be  ruled  by  the  godly, 
and  2renerallv  a  double  resurrection — that  of  the 
pious  for  the  thousand-year  kingdom,  and  that 
of  the  rest  of  the  dead  for  general  judgment  at 
the  end.  The  doctrine  was  commonly  thought  of 
as  meaning  that  the  pious  would  have  perfect  en- 
joyment of  spiritual  and  physical  blessings,  and 
share  Christ's  rule  over  sinners,  or  men  who  do 
not  partake  of  his  glory.  Of  course  the  view  has 
suffered  various  modifications,  but,  in  general,  it 
may  be  said  that  it  rejects  the  idea  of  a  normal 
historical  development  of  Christianity,  for  the 
millennium  is  not  the  result  of  spiritual  work 
and  spiritual  laws,  but  the  sudden  invasion  of 
Christ  and  other-life  conditions  on  this  bank  and 
shoal  of  time. 

Chiliasm  is  not,  however,  to  be  confounded 
with  any  special  theory  of  the  time  of  Christ's  re- 
turn.    I  have  already  referred  to  the  general 


100  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

expectation  of  the  early  coming  of  Christ  in 
the  apostolic  and  post-apostolic  times.  Men  who 
held  that  might  not  be  chiliasts  or  premillenni- 
alists,  though  they  doubtless  often  were.  The 
indispensable  note  of  the  chiliast  is  the  interme- 
diate world  period  of  a  thousand  years  under  the 
imposing  and  interesting  auspices  of  the  personal 
bodily  reign  of  the  Lord.  Chiliasm  certainly 
presented  a  fascinating  program :  one  cannot  be 
surprised  at  its  wide  vogue.  What  were  its 
sources? 

Parseeism,  the  religion  of  Persia  as  reformed 
by  Zoroaster,  was  the  first  to  proclaim  the  thou- 
sand-year reign,  when  the  evil  kingdom  would  be 
overthrown.  Old  Testament  prophecy  did  not 
have  the  idea.  "It  simply  promised  a  kingdom 
of  the  Messiah  in  which  after  a  restoration  of  the 
Jewish  state  and  uniting  of  all  people  in  a  com- 
mon worship  of  Jehovah,  the  happiness  of  the 
improved  nation  would  be  manifested  by  external 
prosperity  and  glorified  peace.  Out  of  this  pic- 
ture of  the  future  the  materializing  spirit  of  later 
Judaism,  which  interpreted  the  prophets  in  a 
sensuous  way  without  distinguishing  between 
fact  and  picture,  took  hold  with  preference  of  the 
political  side,  under  pressure  of  the  civil  position. 
But  this  hope  of  the  future  received  still  a  more 
transcendental  character.  The  idea  of  world 
judgment  and  world  destruction,  of  the  resurrec- 
tion of  the  dead,  of  the  other  life,  obtained  shape 


The  Chiliastic  Crisis  101 

and  influence.  An  opposition  developed  between 
this  life  and  the  other,  between  the  old  Jewish 
hope  of  a  happy  life  ot  the  pious  in  a  happy  land 
and  new  conceptions  of  a  heavenly  kingdom,  be- 
fore which  the  present  world  passes  away.  In 
the  interest  of  overcoming  this  opposition,  the 
idea  of  an  intermediate  kingdom  (chiliasm)  in 
which  all  earthly  expectations  would  be  satisfied, 
and  upon  which  final  joys  of  the  other  life  would 
follow,  may  have  risen.  It  was  not  the  prevailing 
sentiment  of  the  Jews  in  the  time  of  Christ.  Ac- 
cording to  Dan.  2.  44  and  Psalms  of  Solomon  17. 
4,  the  Messianic  kingdom  is  the  eternal  and  final 
one.  But  the  chiliastic  sentiment  is  present  in 
the  prophecy  of  the  ten  weeks  in  Enoch  93;  91. 
12-19 ;  in  4  Ezra  7.  28f.,  and  in  the  apocalypse  of 
Baruch  40.  3.  The  sketch  is  the  most  complete 
in  4  Ezra:  the  last  oppression,  the  advent  of  the 
Messiah,  the  war  of  the  nations  against  the  Mes- 
siah and  their  overthrow,  descent  of  the  heavenly 
Jerusalem,  gathering  together  of  the  scattered 
Israel,  the  four-hundred-year  kingdom  of  the 
Messiah,  the  seven  days  silence,  the  renewing  of 
the  world,  the  general  resurrection,  the  last 
Judgment,  eternal  salvation  and  eternal  damna- 
tion. With  such  an  apocalyptic  there  went  the 
reckoning  of  the  world-periods.  The  later  fa- 
vorite reckoning  in  the  Church  of  six  thousand 
or  seven  thousand  years  was  already  met  with 
in  the  translators  of  the  Pentateuch,  placed  by 


102     '    Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

Lagarde  about  B.  C.  280,  and  then  in  the  book  of 
Enoch,  chapter  33."^ 

For  those  readers  who  have  not  at  their  elbows 
these  Apocryphal  books  of  later  Judaism  I  give 
the  words  or  the  tenor  of  the  passages  referred 
to.    Psalms  of  Solomon  17.  4  (B.  C.  65-40;  to  be 
distinguished  from  the  odes  of  Solomon  recently 
discovered  and  published  by  J.  Rendel  Harris)  : 
"And  the  Kingdom  of  our  God  shall  be  over  the 
Gentiles  for  ever  [unto  judgment].''     Enoch  93 
(perhaps  B.  C.  166-98)  gives  the  seven  weeks  of 
sacred  history  and  what  will  occur  at  the  end  of 
each.    At  the  end  of  the  seventh  week  the  elect 
will    receive    sevenfold    instruction    concerning 
God's  whole  creation.    Enoch  91.  12-19  gives  the 
doings  at  the  end  of  the  eighth,  ninth,  and  tenth 
weeks.    "In  the  10th  week  in  the  Tth  part  there 
will  be  the  great  eternal  judgment,  in  which  He 
will  execute  vengeance  among  the  angels.    And 
the  first  heaven  will  depart  and  pass  away,  and  a 
new  heaven  will  appear,  and  all  the  powers  of 
the  heavens  will  shine  sevenfold  forever.     And 
after  that  there  will  be  many  weeks  without  num- 
ber forever  in  goodness  and  righteousness,  and 
sin  will  be  no  more  mentioned  forever."  4  Ezra  or 
Esdras  =  2  Ezra  7.  28ff.  (after  A.  D.  70)  :  "For 
my  own  Jesus  [better  reading,  Messias]  shall  be 
revealed  with  those  that  are  with  him,  and  they 

1  Semisch-Bratke,   art.,   "(3iiliasm\is,"   in  Herzog-Hauck,  3  Aufl., 
vol.  iii  (1897),  pp.  806,  807. 


The  Chiliastic  Crisis  103 

that  remain  shall  rejoice  for  four  hundred  years. 
And  it  shall  come  to  pass  after  these  years  that 
my  Son  Christ  shall  die,  and  all  men  that  have 
breath.  And  the  world  shall  be  turned  into  the 
old  silence  seven  days,  as  in  the  first  beginnings, 
so  that  no  man  shall  be  left.  And  it  shall  come 
to  pass  after  seven  days  the  world,  that  yet 
awaketh  not,  shall  be  raised  up,  and  what  is  cor- 
rupt shall  die.  And  the  earth  shall  restore  those 
that  are  asleep  in  her,  and  the  dust  those  that 
dwell  in  silence  in  it,  and  the  chambers  shall 
deliver  those  souls  that  were  committed  unto 
them.  And  the  Most  High  shall  be  revealed  upon 
the  seat  of  judgment,  and  mercy  shall  pass  away, 
and  long  suffering  shall  have  an  end;  but  judg- 
ment only  shall  remain,  and  truth  shall  stand, 
and  faith  shall  grow  strong,  and  one's  work  shall 
follow,  and  one's  reward  shall  be  shown,  and 
righteous  dealings  shall  be  awake,  and  unright- 
eous dealings  sleep  [received  text,  rule]  not." 
Apocalypse  of  Baruch  40.  3  (after  A.  D.  70,  to  be 
distinguished  from  the  well-known  Book  of 
Baruch)  :  "And  his  principate  will  stand  forever, 
until  the  world  of  corruption  is  at  an  end,  and 
until  the  times  aforesaid  are  fulfilled."  Enoch 
33  is  probably  a  misprint  for  93. 

Christ  was  no  chiliast.  In  Mark  1.  15  he  pro- 
claims that  the  time  of  the  coming  of  the  kingdom 
is  fulfilled,  but  of  a  provisionary  kingdom,  of  a 
distinction    betv/een    his    and   his    Father's,   he 


104         Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

knows  nothing.    His  return  is  no  other  than  the 
final  Judgment  itself,  which  he  himself  is  to 
carry  out,  until  which  the  wheat  and  tares  grow 
together  (Matt.  13.  30,  41f.;  16.  27;  24;  25.  llf., 
31f.).    The  "resurrection  of  the  just"  (Luke  14. 
14)  does  not  issue  in  another  world-period  which 
goes  before  the  final  coming.  With  the  final  Judg- 
ment there  is  united  the  world-renewing  (Matt. 
19.  28 ) .    In  the  portrayal  of  the  glory  of  the  king- 
dom of  heaven  he  uses  ideas  and  figures  easily  com- 
prehended by  everyone,  describes  the  future  con- 
summation in  phrases  easily  gotten  hold  of,  and, 
instead  of  mystical  suggestions,  he  comforts  his 
own  with  the  intimation  that,  according  to  place 
and  condition,  there  is  a  connection  between  the 
highest  earthly  joy  and  the  happiness  of  the 
Messianic  time  (Mark  10.  40;  13.  27;  Matt.  5.  4; 
8.  11 ;  22.  1-14 ;  25.  1-13 ;  Luke  13.  29 ;  4.  15-24 ; 
22.  16,  30) .    But  as  he  earned  the  ingratitude  of 
his  people  because  he  disappointed  their  sensu- 
ous hopes,  so  he  had  to  make  clear  to  the  Sad- 
ducees  (Mark  12.  24f.)  that  they  knew  neither 
the  Scripture  nor  the  power  of  God  if  they  be- 
lieved that  the  other  life  could  and  would  only 
repeat  the  earthly  world  order,  and  no  new  spir- 
itual order  set  in  its  place;  and  in  his  parting 
hour  he  had  to  bring  home  to  his  disciples  the 
fact  that  the  future  joys  of  the  kingdom  of  God 
are  to  be  spiritual,  or  supersensuous,  when  he 
promised  to  them  that  in  the  consummated  king- 


The  Chii.iastic  Crisis  105 

dom  of  God  he  would  drink  of  the  fruit  of  Christ 
vine  "new,"  that  is,  not  again,  but  as  glorified. 

The  Jewish  Christians,  of  course,  were  open  to 
appeal  from  apocalyptic,  chiliastic  visions,  hopes, 
and  beliefs.  The  New  Testament  as  a  whole  is 
remarkably  free  from  them.  There  is  the  famous 
passage  in  Rev.  20.  4fe.,  which  has  been  both  a 
starting  and  a  returning  point  for  any  amount  of 
speculation  in  this  territory.  Its  true  interpre- 
tation I  must  turn  over  to  exegetical  scholars, 
though  I  must  confess  I  have  considerable  sym- 
pathy with  the  remark  of  Semisch-Bratke  already 
quoted,  that  "with  the  difficulty  of  distinguish- 
ing between  picture  and  object  (or  fact)  the 
chiliasm  of  the  Apocalypse  remains  a  hieroglyph, 
which,  in  spite  of  the  intensive  investigating 
work  which  that  book  has  recently  received,  still 
awaits  satisfactory  solution."  It  is  interesting 
that  the  later  chiliasts  did  not  build  much  on 
that  passage,  but  generally  on  the  views  and 
visions  of  the  Old  Testament,  which,  in  the  lack 
of  scientific  exegesis,  could  be  easily  turned  to 
their  purpose. 

No  doubt  the  persecutions  were  another  factor 
in  turning  the  mind  to  the  delights  of  an  earthly 
reign  of  Christ.  As  martyrdom  was  the  sowing, 
so  the  kingdom  of  Christ  was  the  great  harvest 
day  of  the  Church.  From  the  afflictions  of  the 
present  the  gaze  was  fixed  upon  the  coming  thou- 
sand years  of  joy.    If  we  may  believe  a  quotation 


106  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

in  Eusebius^  the  great  heretic  Cerinthus,  a  con- 
temporary of  John,  was  a  strong  realistic  chil- 
iast,  and  the  views  also  existed  in  other  societies 
of  Jewish  heretics. 

Among  regular  Church  teachers  also  views 
partially  chiliastic  prevailed.  Thus  Barnabas 
(placed  by  Weizsacker  and  Lightfoot  A.  D.  70- 
79,  by  Hilgenfeld  A.  D.  96-98,  by  others  later), 
speaking  of  God  resting  after  his  six  days'  labor, 
says  (chapter  15)  :  "He  meaneth  this,  that  in  six 
thousand  years  the  Lord  shall  bring  all  things  to 
an  end;  for  the  day  with  him  signifieth  a  thou- 
sand years ;  and  this  he  himself  beareth  me  wit- 
ness, saying,  Behold  the  day  of  the  Lord  shall  be 
as  a  thousand  years  [2  Pet.  3.  3].  Therefore, 
children,  in  six  days,  that  is,  in  six  thousand 
years,  everything  shall  come  to  an  end.''  Com- 
menting on  "He  resteth  on  the  seventh  day,"  he 
adds:  "This  he  meaneth:  when  his  Son  shall 
come,  and  shall  abolish  the  time  of  the  Lawless 
One,  and  shall  judge  the  ungodly,  and  shall 
change  the  sun  and  the  moon  and  the  stars,  then 
shall  he  truly  rest  on  the  seventh  day."  Here  we 
have  a  definite  teaching  of  Christ's  return  at  the 
end  of  six  thousand  years,  but  no  statement  of  an 
earthly  kingdom.  The  coming  seems  to  bring 
the  end.  The  Teaching  of  the  Twelve  Apostles 
( about  A.  D.  100-125 )  believes  firmly  in  the  com- 
ing, but  says  nothing  of  millennial  reign.    "May 

1  Historica  Ecclesvastica  3.  28,  2. 


The  Chiliastic  Crisis  107 

grace  come  and  this  world  pass  away"  (chapter 
10).  Speaking  of  the  signs  of  the  end  (chapter 
16)  :  "Then  all  created  mankind  shall  come  to  the 
fire  of  testing,  and  many  shall  be  offended  and 
perish;  but  they  that  endure  in  their  faith  shall 
be  saved  by  the  Curse  himself  [compare  Gal.  3. 
13].  And  then  shall  the  signs  of  the  truth  ap- 
pear; first  a  sign  of  a  rift  in  the  heaven,  then  a 
sign  of  a  voice  of  a  trumpet,  and,  thirdly,  a  resur- 
rection of  the  dead;  yet  not  all,  but  as  it  was 
said :  The  Lord  shall  come  and  all  his  saints  with 
him  [Zech.  14.  5].  Then  shall  the  world  see  the 
Lord  coming  upon  the  clouds  of  the  heaven" 
(Matt.  24.  30).  The  same  certainty  of  the  end 
breathes  in  the  Ancient  Homily  (=  "2  Clement" 
A.  D.  120-140,  chapter  12),  where  the  preacher 
says :  "Let  us  therefore  await  the  kingdom  of  God 
betimes  in  love  and  righteousness,  since  we  know 
not  the  day  of  God's  appearing.  For  the  Lord 
himself,  being  asked  by  a  certain  person  when 
his  kingdom  would  come,  said:  when  the  two 
shall  be  one  and  the  outside  as  the  inside,  and 
the  male  with  the  female,  neither  male  nor  fe- 
male" (quotation  probably  from  the  Gospel  of 
the  Egyptians).  Here  also  a  silence  as  to  the 
thousand-year  kingdom. 

Papias  of  Hierapolis,  said  to  have  been  a 
hearer  of  John  the  apostle,  who  wrote  Exposition 
of  Oracles  of  the  Lord  about  A.  D.  130,  unfor- 
tunately lost  except  for  fragments,  had  a  suffi- 


108  ,  ,     Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

ciently  sensuous  idea  of  tlie  kingdom.  His  de- 
scription fairly  makes  one's  head  swim.  Irenaeus 
(A.  D.  160-180)  quotes  him  (5.  33)  :  "The  days 
will  come  in  which  vines  shall  grow,  each  having 
10,000  shoots,  and  each  shoot  10,000  branches, 
and  on  each  branch  again  10,000  twigs,  on  each 
twig  10,000  clusters,  and  on  each  cluster  10,000 
grapes,  and  each  grape  when  pressed  shall  yield 
twenty-five  measures  of  wine.  And  when  any  of 
the  saints  shall  have  taken  hold  of  one  of  their 
clusters,  another  shall  cry,  I  am  a  better  cluster ; 
take  me,  bless  the  Lord  through  me.  Likewise 
a  grain  of  wheat  shall  produce  10,000  heads, 
and  every  head  shall  have  10,000  grains,  and 
every  grain  ten  pounds  of  fine  flour  bright  and 
clean,  and  the  other  fruits,  seeds,  and  grass  shall 
produce  in  similar  proportions;  and  all  the  ani- 
mals using  the  fruits  which  are  products  of  the 
soil  shall  become  in  their  turn  peaceable  and 
harmonious,  obedient  to  men  in  all  subjection.'^ 
Papias  does  not  here  in  so  many  words  connect 
this  fruitfulness  of  the  earth  and  quiet  subjection 
of  animals  with  the  personal  reign  of  Christ  on 
earth,  but  it  may  fairly  be  assumed  that  the  con- 
nection exists.  Irenaeus  himself,  a  much  heavier 
weight,  assents  heartily  to  Papias's  faith,  and 
adds  on  his  own  responsibility:  "The  blessing 
thus  foretold  belongs  undoubtedly  to  the  times 
of  the  kingdom,  when  the  righteous  shall  rise 
from  the  dead  and  reign,  and  when,  too,  creation, 


The  Chiliastic  Crisis  109 

renewed  and  freed  from  bondage,  shall  produce  a 
wealth  of  food  of  all  kinds  from  the  dew  of  heaven 
and  from  the  fatness  of  the  earth.'' 

In  his  Dialogue  iclth  Trypho  (about  A.  D.  145- 
150),  chapter  80,  the  question  is  put  to  Justin 
Martyr :  Do  you  expect  your  people  to  be  gathered 
together  and  made  joyful  with  Christ  and  the 
patriarchs  and  the  prophets,  both  the  men  of  our 
nation  and  the  proselytes?  Justin  replies  that 
many  are  of  this  opinion,  among  others  himself, 
but  by  no  means  all;  for  "many  who  belong  to 
the  pure  and  pious  faith  and  are  true  Christians 
think  otherwise."  Still  "I  and  others  who  are 
right-minded  Christians  in  all  points  are  as- 
sured there  will  be  a  resurrection  of  the  dead, 
of  a  thousand  years  in  Jerusalem,  which  will 
then  be  built,  adorned,  enlarged,  as  the  prophets 
Ezekiel  and  Isaiah  and  others  declare."  I  can- 
not but  feel  that  there  is  a  good  deal  of  plausi- 
bility in  the  remark  of  Harnack,^  to  the  effect 
that  a  "philosopher  like  Justin,  with  a  bias  to- 
ward a  Hellenic  construction  of  the  Christian 
religion,  should,  nevertheless,  have  accepted  its 
chiliastic  elements  is  the  strongest  proof  that 
these  enthusiastic  expectations  were  inseparably 
bound  up  with  the  Christian  faith  down  to  the 
middle  of  the  second  century."  They  were  cer- 
tainly bound  up  with  it  in  the  thought  of  some, 


1  Art.,  "Millennium,"  in  Encydopcedia  Britannica,  9th  edition,  1884, 
vol.  xvl,  p.  328. 


110 ,  ,      Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

but  Justin  himself  admits  that  they  were  not 
absolutely  essential,  as  good  Christians  did  not 
share  them.  On  the  other  hand,  in  the  writings 
of  Ignatius,  Polycarp,  Tatian,  Athenagoras,  and 
Theophilus  of  Antioch  there  is  not  a  trace  of  the 
millennial  faith.  But  perhaps  one  ought  not  to 
build  too  much  on  this  silence,  which  may  have 
been  due,  some  suggest,  to  political  caution. 
From  the  words  quoted  in  Eusebius  5.  24,  5,  con- 
cerning Melito,  bishop  of  Sardis  about  A.  D. 
160ff.,  "who  lies  in  Sardis,  awaiting  the  episco- 
pate from  heaven,  when  he  shall  rise  from  the 
dead,''  it  has  been  supposed  that  he  too  was  a 
chiliast.  Tertullian  belonged  to  this  school,  even 
independently  of  his  Montanism  {Contra  Mar- 
cionem^  3.  24),  as  well  as  Hippolytus — two  great 
names  in  Church  history. 

Chiliasm  broke  on  the  spiritual  ideas  of  the 
Alexandrian  fathers.  Matter  was  too  much 
connected  with  evil  to  satisfy  the  lofty  idealism 
of  Origen.  Therefore  the  end  of  redemption  must 
be  an  entire  doing  away  with  the  sensuous  and 
rosy-tinted  pictures  of  material  bliss  painted  by 
the  chiliasts.  Origen  looked  upon  all  such  things 
as  stories  of  Jews  or  idolatry  of  the  letter  [De 
Principiis  2.  11).  Other  forces  were  working 
against  the  millennial  hope.  Just  as  to-day  a 
theory  of  evolution  and  the  whole  scientific  trend 
is  slowly  undermining  supernatural  religion 
among  many  minds,  so  in  the  second  and  third 


The  Chiliastic  Crisis  111 

centuries  philosophical  and  theological  thinking 
was  getting  beyond  the  reach  of  the  old  catastro- 
phic faith,  with  its  fantastic  attachments.    As  I 
have  shown,  Montanism  was  a  reaction  against 
this  new  theology.    The  influence  of  the  Alexan- 
drian teachers  was  dead  against  the  old  views. 
An  Egyptian  bishop,  Nepos,  bounded  into  the 
breach  to  save  the  day  for  chiliasm  in  his  book 
IXeyxo^    aXXeyo^Loru^v   (about  A.  D.  260).     Bishop 
Dionysius,  of  Alexandria,  came  out  against  him, 
and  proved  that  the  prophets  must  be  interpreted 
allegorically.     In  this  fight  the  book  of  Revela- 
tion was  appealed  to,  and  Dionysius  felt  that  he 
must  get  that  book  thrown  out  of  the  canon  of  the 
Bible.    He  succeeded.    "At  the  time  of  Eusebius 
the  Greek  Church  was  saturated  with  prejudice 
against  the  book  and  with  doubts  as  to  its  can- 
onicity.     In  the  course  of  the  fourth  century  it 
was  removed  from  the  Greek  canon,  and  thus  the 
troublesome  foundation  on  which  chiliasm  might 
have  continued  to  build  was  gotten  rid  of."    So 
chiliasm  died  in  the  Greek  Church,  as  well  as 
many  other  Christian  things  much  worthier  of 
life.    But  the  Latin  theologians  were  faithful  to 
the  millennial  tradition   much  longer,   and  by 
them  also  the  Apocalypse  of  John  was  main- 
tained without  a  doubt.    But  after  the  end  of  the 
fourth  century  chiliasm  gradually  disappeared. 
This  was  due  to  the  influence  of  Greek  theology, 
and   to   the   altered   political   relations   of   the 


112  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

Church  and  world  which  seemed  to  give  no  place 
to  the  early  hopes.  History  was  teaching  an- 
other lesson.  Augustine,  the  great  bishop  of 
Hippo  (A.  D.  395ff.)  in  north  Africa,  got  hold 
of  this  idea,  and  with  it  brought  in  a  new  era. 
The  actual  Catholic  Church  is  the  eternal  king- 
dom of  God  which  is  to  be  set  up  in  the  world, 
and  which  he  has  set  up,  and  there  is  no  other. 
The  millennial  kingdom  began  when  Christ  came, 
and  it  is  already  in  the  world.  The  Church  must 
step  in  and  take  its  rights  which  the  falling  em- 
pire is  bequeathing  to  it.  With  these  thoughts 
Augustine  destroyed  chiliasm  as  a  faith  of  in- 
telligent men.  It  still  existed  here  and  there, 
but  it  had  had  its  day. 

Can  there  be  any  doubt  that  in  this  matter 
history  is  a  better  teacher  than  misinterpreted 
prophecy,  a  safer  foundation  than  an  inverted 
pyramid  built  on  an  obscure  text  of  an  obscure 
apocalypse?  The  kingdom  of  heaven  shall  be 
like  unto  leaven  which  a  woman  took  and  hid  in 
three  measures  of  meal.  That  seems  the  divine 
plan,  the  divine  philosophy.  To  work  with  all 
our  powers  to  secure  the  progressive  penetration 
of  the  world  by  Christ  is  both  more  rational  and 
more  Christian  than  to  expect  great  things  from 
a  colossal  stroke  of  state  to  bolster  up  a  failing 
cause.  But  the  end  shall  come  and  the  Judg- 
ment, but  the  times  and  seasons  God  has  placed 
in  his  own  power. 


CHAPTER  VII 

The  Arian  Crisis  :  or.  Have  We  a  Saviour  as 
Divine  as  He  is  Human? 

Is  Jesus  Christ  as  truly  divine  as  he  is  truly 
human?  That  was  the  question  raised  by  the 
Arian  crisis,  and  perhaps  no  more  important 
question  has  ever  been  raised  in  the  history  of 
religion.  On  its  answer  Christianity  itself 
hangs:  whether  it  is  one  of  many  religions,  a 
beautiful  ethic,  fine  sentiments  uttered  by  a 
Galilsean  dreamer  and  prophet,  a  better  Judaism, 
a  better  Stoicism,  or  whether  it  is  the  religion  of 
the  incarnation,  of  salvation  from  sin,  of  bound- 
less hope  and  help  for  lost  men  and  women,  a 
spring  of  new  life,  an  evangel  for  individuals  as 
for  nations,  a  message  of  light  and  of  healing 
which  proclaims  that  if  the  soul  gets  hold  of 
Jesus  Christ  the  arms  of  the  Eternal  God  him- 
self lifts  him  up. 

I  do  not  think  we  should  be  frightened  by  the 
remark  of  the  eminent  Unitarian,  Albert  Reville, 
who,  like  many  of  his  countrymen,  long  since  left 
Calvin  for  Socinus,  that  "if  the  deity  of  Jesus 
Christ  were  essential  to  Christianity,  this  dogma 
would  not  have  had  a  distinct  history."^     Cer- 

1  History  of  Dogma  of  Deity  of  Jesus   Christ,  tr.  London,    1878, 
p   241. 

113 


114      '    Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

tainly,  truth  may  have  a  history  as  well  as  error, 
and  if  it  is  a  live  truth  it  will  grow.  Historically, 
the  only  question  is,  Did  the  first  Christians  be- 
lieve in  the  divinity  of  Christ?  If  so,  in  what 
sense,  and  why?  If  not,  why  not?  Were  they 
mistaken?  If  it  could  be  shown  that  the  early 
Christians  never  dreamed  that  Christ  was  divine 
except  in  the  sense  in  which  good  and  great  men 
are  divine,  that  would  be  a  most  interesting  dis- 
covery, a  tremendously  important  fact,  and  yet 
it  would  not  necessarily  bind  our  faith,  because 
in  matters  of  religion  the  all-important  thing  is. 
Is  it  true?  Not,  has  it  ever  been  believed  before, 
and,  if  so,  when?  The  early  Christians  were  hope- 
lessly divided  on  important  questions,  and  they 
believed  things  which  no  one  believes  to-day. 
The  weight  placed  upon  history  by  Reville  and 
men  of  his  school  is  not  misplaced,  but  is  one- 
sided. It  needs  balancing  by  other  factors,  for 
the  deeper  question  as  to  a  doctrine  is  always,  Is 
it  true?  To  answer  that,  history  is  very  im- 
portant, but  other  factors  are  also  important. 

I  have  already  shown  that  the  notion  of  some 
that  Jesus  was  only  a  spiritually  gifted  genius 
did  not  exist  in  the  first  centuries.  The  burden 
was  to  reconcile  the  actual  things  for  which 
Christianity  stood — that  there  is  one  God  alone, 
ever  living,  loving  and  working,  and  that 
Jesus  Christ  his  Son  is  divine  yet  human. 
In   making   that   reconciliation    Christians   did 


The  Arian  Crisis  115 

not  always  reach  the  same  result.  A  very 
few  (who  finally  shrank  away  and  disap- 
peared) claimed  that  he  was  a  man  and  no 
more,  of  purely  human  origin,  upon  whom  God 
descended  and  made  divine  at  some  point  in  his 
history.  Others  went  further  and  said  that 
Christ  was,  indeed,  of  miraculous  birth,  but  was 
furnished  by  God  with  divinity  at  his  baptism. 
Others  still  cut  the  knot  by  saying  that  Christ 
was  simply  God  the  Father  himself  in  one  of  his 
appearances  or  manifestations  or  unfoldings. 
These  three  schools  were  all  trying  to  keep  Christ 
divine  while  preserving  their  monotheism.  Now, 
there  Avas  a  fourth  party,  just  as  strongly  mono- 
theistic as  the  others,  who,  in  my  judgment,  saw 
the  matter  more  deeply,  more  consistently,  more 
in  accordance  with  Christian  experience,  and, 
as  it  happened — and  this  ought  not  to  be  held 
against  them — more  in  accordance  with  the 
noblest  things  in  non-Christian  philosophy.  This 
party,  starting  from  a  richer  conception  of  God 
and  a  finer  appreciation  of  Christ,  thought  of 
the  latter  as  existing  with  and  in  God  in  the 
eternities,  either  from  eternity  absolutely  or  as 
called  into  being  by  the  will  of  the  Father  from 
his  inmost  life,  and  so  an  actual  part  of  the  mani- 
fold essence  of  the  one  only  God,  which,  partly 
for  the  sake  of  distinction,  might  be  called  his 
Word  (Logos),  his  Wisdom,  his  World  and  Re- 
demption side,  and  jet  existing  not  simply  in 


116  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

thought  or  figure  or  as  an  attribute,  but  in  actual 
hypostatic  "personal"  union  and  communion 
(the  word  "person,"  of  course,  not  to  be  inter- 
preted in  the  ordinary  sense  of  individuals,  which 
would  give  us  two  or  more  Gods ) .  According  to 
this  school,  we  have  arithmetically  only  one  God, 
but  this  one  God  is  not  merely  an  arithmetically 
one  God  (Mohammedanism),  but  a  one  God  in 
a  manifold,  complex,  rich,  abundant  social  life, 
which  in  the  terms  of  revelation  may  be  ex- 
pressed, for  the  lack  of  better  words,  in  the 
phrase,  "Father,  Son,  and  Holy  Spirit" — these 
three  existing  in  a  glorious  hypostatic  essential 
union  and  communion  in  the  life  of  God,  of  which 
analogies  may  be  perceived  in  the  intellect,  sensi- 
bilities, and  will  of  man,  in  the  substance,  heat, 
and  light  of  the  sun.  Now,  it  might  not  have 
happened  that  this  school  was  the  nearest  to 
Christ,  both  historically  and  spiritually,  but  it 
actually  was  so.  That  is  the  view  of  Christ  em- 
bodied as  to  its  essence  in  the  first  three  Gospels. 
I  cannot  stop  to  prove  this,  but  it  is  a  fact.  That 
is  the  view  underneath  the  representations  in  the 
Acts;  that  is  the  view  which  flowers  out  in  the 
pastures  of  Paul ;  that  is  the  view  of  Peter,  and, 
of  course — though  not  more  so  in  principle,  only 
as  to  expression — in  the  writings  of  John.  And 
when  we  come  to  men  who  may  fairly  be  con- 
sidered as  carrying  on  this  Christian  tradition 
from  these  sources,  with  more  or  less  mixture, 


The  Arian  Crisis  117 

with  more  or  less  fidelity,  we  meet  the  same  con- 
ception, colored  by  their  environment,  by  their 
education,  by  their  literary  purpose,  but  the  same 
essential  conception  of  the  deity  of  Christ,  one 
with  the  Father,  yet  distinct  from  him,  and  yet 
absolutely  human — Ignatius,  Polycarp,  Irenaeus, 
Justin  Martyr,  Tertullian,  Clement  of  Alexan- 
dria, Origen,  Cyprian,  Athanasius. 

In  the  space  at  my  disposal  I  cannot  give  my 
readers  a  detailed  statement  of  the  views  of  these 
men,  but  must  refer  them  to  any  history  of  doc- 
trine within  their  reach.  Sometimes  in  caring 
for  monotheism  there  seems  a  placing  of  Christ 
below  God,  but  at  other  times  the  writer  shows 
that  he  holds  Christ  as  essentially  divine  in  the 
preexistent  life  of  the  Godhead.  It  is  a  part  of 
the  Christian  doctrine  of  God  that  the  Father  is 
the  ruler  and  head  and  spring  of  this  complex 
life,  and  it  is  not  surprising  if  some  of  this  school 
emphasized  that  at  times  unduly,  but  the  essen- 
tial thing  with  them  was  the  oneness  of  Christ  in 
the  eternal  ground  of  Deity,  and  that  part  of  the 
Christianity  of  Christ  and  the  apostles  they 
handed  down  to  us. 

It  is  easy  to  exaggerate  on  one  side  or  the 
other.  For  instance,  Reville  (pp.  80,  81)  gives  a 
gross  caricature  of  the  views  of  Origen  on  Christ. 
"Origen  was  essentially  a  Unitarian.  Stated 
summarily,  his  views  amount  to  this,  that  Jesus 
is  one  of  ourselves  united  to  the  Deity  in  the 


118  .       Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

closest  manner  by  his  moral  sublimity."  Jesus 
"was  man,  certainly  eternal,  but  only  as  we  are, 
and  like  us  in  his  nature.'^  This  thoroughly  shal- 
low view  of  Origen  does  him  great  injustice.  The 
Son  is  the  image  of  the  Father,  his  crown,  his 
wisdom,  his  Logos,  proceeding  from  him  by  a 
process  that  is  part  of  the  being  of  God,  an  eter- 
nal generation.  He  is  of  one  substance  with  the 
Father,  but  is  also  a  distinct  hypostasis  complete 
in  his  own  substance.  "Therefore  we  worship 
the  Father  of  truth  and  the  true  Son,  being  two 
things  in  hypostasis,  but  one  in  sameness  of 
thought  and  in  harmony,  and  in  sameness  of  will 
( Contra  Cclsum^  8, 12 ) .  But  he  is  subordinate  to 
the  Father,  is  not  the  highest,  but,  so  to  speak,  the 
"second  God,''  dependent  upon  the  Father.  This 
Logos  became  man,  so  that  we  have  the  God-man.^ 
There  was  certainly  a  variety  of  elements  in  the 
idea  of  Christ  of  this  marvelously  acute,  sugges- 
tive, and  many-sided  thinker,  but  as  to  his  view 
of  the  Logos  as  being  one  with  the  Father  in  the 
eternal  life  of  God  he  was  a  Trinitarian  through 
and  through.  "The  whole  fullness  of  the  essence 
of  the  Deity"  is  revealed  in  Christ  (Harnack, 
vol.  ii,  p.  375).  Thomasius,  who  studied  with 
great  care  the  theological  ideas  of  Origen,  thus 
sums  up  his  idea  of  the  Trinity :  "There  are  three 
divine,  independent  personalities  (hypostases)  : 
the  Father,  the  Son,  and  the  Holy  Spirit,  which 

i  dedvdpcjTTo^,  De  Principiis,  2.  6, 


The  Arian  Crisis  119 

constitute  the  holy  trias.  What  is  common  to 
them  is  the  divine  being  (scin),  the  deorTjg,  only 
with  this  difference,  that  in  the  Father  it  is  origi- 
nal-essential and  primitive,  in  the  others  derived. 
The  Father  is  the  original  ground,  alone  unbe- 
gotten,  and  elevated  above  both  in  the  measure 
in  which  they  are  elevated  over  all  other  being. 
The  Son  is  the  original  revelation  of  the  Father 
and  the  Mediator  of  all  further  development  of 
absolute  life,  begotten  from  the  Father  in  eter- 
nity and,  therefore,  less.  The  Holy  Spirit, 
finally,  is  the  first  revelation  of  the  Son,  and 
holds  himself  to  him  just  as  the  Son  to  the 
Father,  the  three  hypostases,  therefore,  being 
not  one  (individual  or  Person,  Finer),  but  one 
( Being,  Eins ) .  The  work  of  the  Father  has  to  do 
with  everything  that  is  and  consists  in  the  com- 
munication of  being ;  that  of  the  Son  in  the  com- 
munication of  reason ;  that  of  the  Holy  Spirit  has 
to  do  with  the  saints,  and  completes  in  them 
the  work  of  illumination,  sanctification,  and  be- 
atitude begun  by  the  Father  and  mediated 
through  the  Son."^  O  no;  Origen  had  not 
thought  through  the  Trinity  exactly  in  the  same 
terms  as  Athenasius,  but  he  was  no  Unitarian. 
Eeville  is  slipshod  in  other  representations  as 
well  as  in  this  of  Origen,  but  he  does  not  go  as 
far  as  Pfleiderer  in  his  lecture  delivered  at  the 
History  of  Religions  International  Congress  in 

I  OrigeneM,  Numberg,  1837,  p.  150, 


120   ,       Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

Amsterdam  in  September,  1903,  expanded  into  a 
book,  The  Early  Christian  Conception  of  Christ 
(1905),  who  reduces  Christ  to  a  level  of  Oriental 
myths,  and  throws  all  his  divine  attributes  and 
acts  into  a  scrap  heap  of  fables  and  legends. 

I  have  already  referred  (p.  84)  to  what  are 
called  the  dynamistic  Monarchians,  who  followed 
a  line  of  thought  concerning  Christ  which  has 
fascinated  many.  Among  others  Paul  of  Samo- 
sata,  so  called  from  his  birth  in  the  Syrian  city 
on  the  Euphrates,  who  became  bishop  about  A. 
D.  260  of  the  most  important  see  of  the  East, 
Antioch,  then  attached  to  the  territories  of  the 
famous  Queen  Zenobia,  of  Palmyra,  for  whom 
he  was  a  kind  of  vice-regent.  For  him  Jesus  was 
a  man  and  no  more  as  to  any  essential  pre- 
existence  with  God.  But  he  was  very  much  more 
than  a  man  (1)  in  his  miraculous  birth,  (2)  in 
being  from  birth  anointed  with  the  Holy  Spirit, 
and  (3)  in  having  received  the  Logos,  or  Reason, 
of  God,  this  Logos  not  being  a  separate  hypo- 
stasis in  the  life  of  God,  but  an  attribute,  like  the 
reason  in  man.  On  account  of  these  furnishings 
he  was  not  only  born  pure  and  holy,  but  he  re- 
mained thus  all  his  life,  achieving  a  perfect  moral 
union  with  God.  He  thus  became  our  Redeemer 
and  won  the  prize  of  love.  Though  Paul  thus 
secured  the  moral  divinity  of  Christ — if  one 
might  so  call  it — in  the  strongest  way,  yet  his 
contemporaries   were   so    dissatisfied   with    his 


The  Arian  Crisis  121 

teachings  that  they  called  councils  in  Antioch 
to  consider  them,  and,  as  Eusebius  says  (7.  29), 
"his  false  doctrine  was  clearly  shown  before  all, 
and  he  was  excommunicated  from  the  Catholic 
Church  under  heaven/'  Many  of  our  modern 
liberals  echo  with  the  necessary  variations  the 
ideas  of  the  Samosatan. 

There  was  another  man  in  Antioch,  probably 
born  in  the  same  town  with  Paul  of  Samo- 
sata,  who  sympathized  with  his  views  so  far 
as  to  withdraw  from  communion  with  the 
bishops  who  had  excommunicated  him,^  and 
whom  Theodoret  makes  the  spiritual  progenitor 
of  Arius  and  his  followers.  In  the  letter  of  Arius 
to  Eusebius,  bishop  of  Nicomedia,  quoted  by 
Theodoret  (1.  4),  the  former  calls  his  friend  "my 
fellow  Lucianist."  It  is  evident,  therefore,  that 
the  able  presbyter,  Lucian,  the  head  of  an  exe- 
getical  school  in  Antioch,  was  the  link  between 
Paul  of  Samosata  and  Arius.  "It  is  possible,'' 
says  Harnack,2  "that  Lucian  not  only  shared  the 
views  of  his  townsman,  but  became  the  head  of 
the  national  Syrian  party  in  the  Antioch  church 
in  opposition  to  the  Hellenistic  Roman.''  How- 
ever, the  agreement  could  not  have  been  perfect 
or  enduring,  for  Lucian  must  have  later  taught 
the  premundane  creation  of  the  Logos  and  his 
full  personality  in  the  flesh  of  Jesus.     This  is 


1  Theodoret,  1.  3. 

*  In  Herzog-Haitck,  3  Aufl.,  1902,  vol.  id,  p.  655. 


122  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

shown  both  by  the  Christological  ideas  of  his 
scholars,  and  by  the  different  way  in  which  the 
historian  Eusebius,  of  Csesarea,  treats  him  and 
Paul,  whom  he  looks  upon  as  a  dangerous  error- 
ist. 

Arius  was  a  presbyter  of  Alexandria,  a  pupil 
of  Lucian,  a  bright,  earnest  man,  tall,  lean,  with 
a  somber  brow,  austere  and  irreproachable  in 
morals,  with  a  smooth,  winning  address,  but  ever 
ready  for  a  theological  fight. 

What  his  views  were  he  sets  forth  himself  in  a 
letter  to  his  friend  and  sympathizer,  Eusebius, 
bishop  of  Nicomedia,  so  interesting  and  impor- 
tant that  I  copy  it  from  Blomfield  Jackson's 
translation  of  Theodoret  (1.  4),  putting  in  italics 
the  important  parts  and  revising  the  translation 
in  places  to  bring  it  nearer  the  original : 

To  his  very  dear  lord,  the  man  of  God,  the  faithful  and  ortho- 
dox Eusebius,  Arius,  unjustly  persecuted  by  Alexander  the  pope 
[bishop  of  Alexandria],  on  account  of  that  aU-conquering  truth 
of  which  you  also  are  a  champion,  sendeth  greeting  in  the  Lord. 

Ammonius,  my  father,  being  about  to  depart  to  Nicomedia,  I 
considered  myself  bound  to  salute  you  by  him,  and  withal  to 
inform  that  natural  affection  which  you  bear  toward  the  breth- 
ren for  the  sake  of  God  and  his  Christ,  that  the  bishop  greatly 
wastes  and  persecutes  us,  and  leaves  no  stone  unturned  against 
us  [literally,  "moves  every  rope";  the  common  proverb  was, 
"to  let  out  every  reef,"  or  "rope";  also  "to  move  everjrthing," 
Xiveiv  Trdv  xPVf^o].  He  has  driven  us  out  of  the  city  as  atheists 
because  we  do  not  concur  in  what  he  pubHcly  preaches,  namely, 
God  always,  the  Son  always;  as  the  Father,  so  the  Son;  the  Son 
coexists  unbegotten  with  God;  he  is  everlasting;  neither  by 
thought,  nor  by  any  interval  does  God  precede  the  Son  [it  is 
doubtful  if  Alexander  would  have  acknowledged  this  clause]; 


The  Arian  Crisis  123 

always  God,  always  Son;  he  is  begotten  of  the  unbegotten;  the 
Son  is  of  God  himself.  Eusebius,  your  brother  bishop  of  Caesarea, 
Theodotus  [bishop  of  Laodicea  in  Syria],  Paulinus  [bishop  of 
Tyre,  then  of  Antioch],  Athanasius  [bishop  of  Anazarbus  in 
Cihcia,  to  be  distinguished  from  his  great  namesake],  Gregorius 
[bishop  of  Berytus  or  Beyrout],  Aetius  [bishop  of  Lydda],  and  all 
the  bishops  of  the  East  have  been  condemned  because  they  say 
that  God  had  an  existence  prior  to  that  of  his  Son;  except 
Philogonicus,  Hellenicus,  and  Macarius,  who  are  unlearned 
men,  and  have  embraced  heretical  opinions.  Some  say  the  Son 
is  an  eructation,  others  that  he  is  a  production,  others  that  he 
is  also  unbegotten.  These  are  impieties  to  which  we  cannot 
listen  even  though  the  heretics  threaten  us  with  a  thousand 
deaths.  But  we  say  and  believe,  and  have  taught  and  do  teach, 
that  the  Son  is  not  unbegotten,  nor  in  any  part  of  the  unbegotten, 
nor  from  anything  underlying,  but  that  by  will  and  counsel  he  has 
subsisted  before  time  and  before  ages  as  perfect  God,  only  begotten 
and  unchangeable,  and  that  before  he  was  begotten,  or  created,  or 
purposed,  or  established,  he  was  not.  For  he  was  not  unbegotten. 
We  are  persecuted  because  we  say  that  the  Son  has  a  beginning, 
but  that  God  is  without  beginning.  This  is  the  cause  of  our 
persecutions,  and  likewise  because  we  say  that  he  is  of  the  non- 
existent [£^  ovK  ovTuv  earcv].  And  this  we  say  because  he  is 
neither  part  of  God  nor  of  anything  underlying  [e^  vnoKeijuivov 
TivSg^  the  same  expression  as  above,  and  which  means,  "from 
any  substance,  or  underlying  essence,"  the  intention  being  to 
deny  Christ's  begetting  from  the  essence  of  God,  Arius  holding 
that  he  was  created  out  of  nothing];  for  this  we  are  persecuted; 
the  rest  you  know.  I  bid  thee  farewell  in  the  Lord,  remember- 
ing our  afflictions,  my  fellow-Lucianist  and  true  Eusebius. 

From  other  expressions  of  Arius  we  learn  that 
he  believed  that  the  Son  is  the  Logos  and  wisdom 
of  the  Father,  but  not  the  Logos  immanent  in 
God,  but  only  participating  in  it.  The  Logos  is 
divine  energy,  the  Son  a  created  divine  Being, 
through  whom  the  world  is  created.  Through 
his  enjoyment  of  the  divine  favor  he  receives  the 


124  '       Ceises  in  the  Early  Church 

name  "God"  and  "Son  of  God/'  "The  Logos  is 
different  from  and  unlike  the  substance  [ovaia] 
and  peculiar  nature  [idLOTrjTog]  of  the  Father  in  all 
respects.''^  He  is  by  nature  mutable,  but  God 
saw  that  he  would  remain  good,  and  conferred 
upon  him  in  advance  the  divine  glory  that  he 
merited.  The  doctrine  is  certainly  a  strange  con- 
glomeration. Loots  quotes^  Hermann  Schultz  as 
saying  that  "it  is  in  content  the  most  baseless 
and  dogmatically  worthless  of  all  the  Christo- 
logies  that  have  ever  appeared  in  the  history  of 
dogma" — and  Schultz  is  right.  A  Unitarian 
scholar  and  lecturer  in  Church  history  at  Har- 
vard University,  the  late  Joseph  Henry  Allen, 
calls  it^  "that  nondescript,  illogical  compro- 
mise,''  which  made  "Christ  the  Son  of  God  very 
much  in  the  same  way  that  Jupiter  was  the  son 
of  Saturn  and  Mars  of  Jupiter.  If  Christians 
are  to  worship  a  divinity  who  is,  after  all,  not 
the  supreme  God,  what  are  they  better  than  their 
enemies?"  Arius  came  out  with  these  views 
about  A.  D.  318. 

Now,  it  is  instructive  that  no  sooner  did  Arius 
thus  come  forth  than  he  evoked  a  bitter  opposi- 
tion. Alexander,  his  bishop,  preached  against 
him  with  positiveness,  showing  that  the  Son  can- 
not have  come  into  existence  in  time,  since  time 


» Arius,    Thalia,  quoted    by    Athanasius,  Oratio    Contra  Arianos, 
1.  2,  §  6.  '  In  Herzog-Hauck,  3  Aufl.,  vol.  ii,  p.  11. 

•  Church  History,  Boston,  1883,  3d  edition,  1889,  vol.  i,  pp.  110,  111. 


The  Arian  Crisis  125 

itself  ("all  things/^  John  1.  3)  was  made  by 
him;  Christ  is  the  effulgence  of  God  (Heb.  1.  3), 
and,  therefore,  to  deny  his  eternity  is  to  deny  the 
eternity  of  the  Father's  light.  His  sonship  is 
therefore  different  in  kind  from  that  of  man. 
Your  view,  says  Alexander,  is  related  to  that  of 
Ebion,  Paul  of  Samosata,  and  Artemas,  and  is 
against  the  "apostolic  doctrines  of  the  Church.'' 
Always  God,  always  Son — that  is  Alexander's 
talisman.  Therefore  the  Son  is  worshiped  with 
the  Father.^  The  bishop  was  so  worked  up  over 
his  presbyter's  views  that  he  called  two  councils 
(A.  D.  320  or  321),  in  both  of  which  the  latter 
was  condemned.  Arius  then  appealed  to  his 
friend  in  Asia  Minor,  Lucian  and  his  circle,  and 
a  synod  in  Bithynia  favored  him — perhaps  under 
the  dread  of  Patripassianism.  The  strife  spread, 
and  Constantine,  who  had  only  recently  be- 
come sole  ruler  of  the  Roman  world,  and  who 
had  the  heathen  idea  of  the  oneness  of  religion 
being  necessary  to  the  oneness  of  the  state,  or  if 
there  were  differences,  that  they  should  be  held 
peaceably  and  buried  under  outward  uniformity, 
felt  that  measures  must  be  taken  to  restore  peace 
to  the  Church.  For  this  purpose  he  called  a 
council  to  meet  at  Nicsea,  in  Bithynia,  where  he 
had  a  summer  palace,  twenty  miles  from  his 
regular  capital  at  Nicomedia.  Nicsea  was  then 
an  important  town  on  the  great  highway  of  com- 

1  Theodoret,  Historia  Ecclesiastica,  1.  3. 


126         Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

merce,  and  easily  accessible  by  water  from  all 
parts  of  the  empire.  This  is  the  first  ecumenical 
council  (A.  D.  325),  a  turning  point  in  the  his- 
tory of  the  Church,  a  date  which  stands  with 
1517  as  the  best  known  in  Church  history.  It 
was  not  actually  an  ecumenical,  or  universal, 
council,  however,  as  the  number  of  bishops  thei^e 
were  at  the  most  only  about  three  hundred,  when 
there  were  really  about  eighteen  hundred  bishops 
in  the  empire.  Nor  was  it  representative  as  to 
sections  of  the  empire,  as  the  whole  Western 
Church  had  only  seven  delegates. 

Constantine  cared  for  the  council  with  princely 
generosity.  He  paid  all  the  traveling  expenses  of 
the  delegates  and  of  their  presbyters  and  serv- 
ants, and  saw  to  their  entertainment  in  Nicsea. 
This  brought  all  the  delegates  under  personal 
obligation  to  him,  and  helped  to  secure  the  ad- 
hesion of  the  council  to  the  views  indorsed  by 
him. 

What  was  the  opinion  of  the  majority  of  the 
council  when  they  came  together?  Bernoulli 
says  that  the  most  of  them  had  no  decided  views 
one  way  or  the  other.  Some  were  ignorant;  a 
few  perhaps  had  never  heard  of  the  controversy; 
others  looked  upon  Christ  as  Lord  and  Saviour 
without  having  thought  through  the  theological 
implications  of  that  belief;  others  still  were  will- 
ing to  vote  according  to  the  strongest  arguments, 
possibly  others  according  to  the  emperor's  wish. 


The  Arian  Crisis  127 

Though  not  acting  as  president,  the  emperor  was 
really  moderator  of  the  council,  hearing  one  and 
then  another,  trying  to  calm  the  Hotspurs,  pro- 
ducing reasons  himself,  and  making  every  effort 
to  get  some  united  decision. 

It  is  significant  of  the  strength  of  the  Athana- 
sian  view  that  Constantine,  though  originally 
surrounded  by  those  entirely  or  partially  in  sym- 
pathy with  Arius,  changed  his  opinion.  His 
bishop  at  Nicomedia  (Eusebius)  was  an  Arian; 
the  bishop  at  Nicaea  itself,  Theognis,  was  an 
Arian ;  and  the  emperor's  friend  and  later  pane^ 
gyrist,  Eusebius,  bishop  of  Csesarea,  the  Church 
historian,  was,  at  least,  not  a  strong  Athanasian, 
but,  rather,  a  follower  of  Origen.  "He  prefer- 
red," says  Bernoulli,  "the  modal  theology  of  the 
Orient,  poorly  decked  out  with  philosophical 
tinsel  work;  and  he  could  not  decide  to  believe 
in  the  unity  of  the  nature  of  the  Son  with  the 
Father."^  Naturally,  the  half -heathen  Constan- 
tine would  be  inclined  to  the  doctrine  of  Lucian 
and  Arius,  which  fitted  in  well  with  the  Koman 
pantheon.  Then  he  gave  Arius,  a  presbyter  con- 
demned by  the  councils  and  bishop  of  his  own 
province,  a  seat  in  the  council,  where  he  took 
part  in  the  debates  and  explained  and  defended 
his  views.  Besides,  as  just  said,  the  bishops  of 
the  East  who  were  nearest  to  Constantine  were 
Arians  and  semi-Arians.     When  we  add  to  all 

•  Das  KonzU  von  Niccea,  Freiberg  im  Breisgau  und  Leipzig,  1896,  9. 


128  '       Crises  in  the  Eaely  Church 

this  the  fact  that  the  Arians  went  to  the  council 
with  unconcealed  confidence  that  they  would  be 
victorious,  we  may  be  quite  sure  on  whose  side 
Constantine  was  at  the  beginning.  The  fact  chat, 
in  spite  of  this  tremendous  difficulty,  the  Atha- 
nasians  won  both  the  council  and  the  emperor 
speaks  volumes. 

Outside  of  the  dummies  and  other  neutrals, 
there  were  three  parties  at  the  beginning — the 
right,  center,  and  left.^  The  right  wing  was  the 
Athanasian,  apparently  not  the  largest,  but  the 
wisest,  the  most  deeply  convinced,  the  most  firm- 
ly intrenched  in  the  Scriptures  and  in  purely  re- 
ligious arguments,  as  well  as  in  Christian  ex- 
perience. The  members  of  this  party  counted, 
among  others,  the  bishops  of  most  of  the  apos- 
tolic centers,  as,  for  example,  Macarius  of  Jeru- 
salem ;  Sylvester  of  Eome ;  Eustathius  of  Antioch ; 
Alexander  of  Alexandria;  as  well  as  Hosius  of 


1  Seeck,  Zeitschrift  filr  Kirchengeschichte,  vol.  xvii,  p.  10  (1897), 
says  that  there  were  only  two  parties,  and  this  is  true  in  the  sense 
of  the  final  and  logical  disposition  of  the  members.  But  it  is  not 
true  in  the  ordinary  sense,  as  may  be  seen  from  Eusebius  of  Csesarea's 
letter  (in  Socrates,  i,  8  and  appendix  to  Athanasius,  De  Decretis) 
compared  with  Theodoret  i,  6.  First,  the  Arians  presented  their 
creed  through  Eusebius  of  Nicomedia,  which  was  rejected,  then 
the  middle  party  presented  the  Caesarean  creed,  which  was  accepted 
with  the  additions  insisted  upon  by  Athanasians.  The  actual  num- 
bering in  the  sources  gives  two  parties  (compare  ixarepov  rayfia 
in  Eusebius,  Vita  Constantini,  iii,  13,  and  Athanasius,  De  Decretis, 
ii,  3),  while  the  historical  facts  in  the  sources  imply  three.  So 
with  the  world  outside.  See  also  Gwatkin,  Studies  of  Arianism 
(London,  1882),  p.  52,  indorsed  by  Harnack,  History  of  Dogmas 
vol.  iii,  p.  137,  note. 


The  Arian  Crisis  129 

Cordova  and  Marcellus  of  Ancyra.  The  center 
was  the  mediatory  party  (headed  by  the  histo- 
rian, Eusebius,  of  Csesarea),  sometimes  called  the 
Origenist  party.  They  were  "neither  fish,  flesh, 
nor  good  red  herring,"  but  they  leaned  toward 
the  Athanasian  view,  it  would  appear,  as  in  the 
end  they  generally  drifted  toward  that  party. 
Some  of  them  had  no  good  clear  views  in  any 
direction,  so  they  went  in  the  end  with  the 
stronger  party.  Others  of  this  large  section  of 
the  council  believed  earnestly  in  the  real  deity 
of  Jesus,  but  cared  nothing  for  scholastic  or 
metaphysical  or  philosophical  terminology. 
They  knew  in  whom  they  believed,  but  they  did 
not  know  why  they  believed  it,  nor  what  their 
belief  implied.  The  left  was  the  Arian  party, 
numbering  about  twenty  bishops,  and  therefore 
greatly  in  the  minority.  They  numbered  Arius 
himself,  who  fought  for  his  views  tooth  and  nail, 
his  old  schoolfellow,  Eusebius  of  Nicomedia, 
later  of  Constantinople,  and  the  bishops  of  the 
places  where  the  first  four  ecumenical  councils 
were  held — Theognis  of  Nicsea,  Maris  of  Chalce- 
don,  and  Monophantes  of  Ephesus. 

The  great  opponent  of  Arius  was  Athanasius, 
deacon,  and  later  (A.  D.  328)  bishop  in  Alexan- 
dria, who  stepped  forward  with  a  decisiveness 
and  power  never  known  before  for  the  doctrine 
of  the  absolute  divinitv  of  Christ,  a  doctrine 
which,  as  I  have  said,  was  in  line  with  the  purest 


130  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

and  straightest  tradition,  and  most  in  harmony 
with  the  New  Testament.  Partial  and  defec- 
tive views  passed  away — of  course  not  imme- 
diately; but  Athanasius's  polemic,  the  precision, 
fullness,  largeness,  and  religious  fervor  of  his 
defense  of  the  doctrine  really  created  a  new  epoch 
in  history.  I  have  not  space  to  do  justice  to  his 
putting  of  the  case;  suffice  it  to  say  that  besides 
a  destructive  criticism  of  Arius's  views,  he 
founded  his  own  on  (1)  a  constant  reference  to 
the  Bible,  (2)  a  showing  of  the  necessity  of  the 
entrance  of  God  himself  into  humanity  to  secure 
(a)  the  full  truth  concerning  God  and  divine 
things,  (h)  fellowship  with  God,  (c)  the  for- 
giveness of  sins  and  the  certainty  of  salvation, 
(d)  immortality  for  man,  and  (e)  that  union 
with  God  w^hich  is  the  glory  of  man.  By  the  in- 
carnation God  himself  has  entered  into  our  race, 
and  thereby  lifted  it  up  into  abiding  fellow- 
ship. The  race  as  such,  therefore,  is,  in  a  sense, 
a  saved  and  deified  race.  We  have  secured  grace 
and  righteousness,  the  Holy  Spirit,  a  new  life, 
with  it  immortality.  It  is  the  religious  motive 
and  life  which  animate  the  discussions  of  Atha- 
nasius  which  give  them  their  peculiar  appeal.  He 
placed  the  defense  of  the  divinity  of  Christ  where 
every  true  Christian,  it  seems  to  me,  must  feel 
that  it  belongs.  And  as  long  as  Christianity  is 
the  religion  of  redemption,  of  salvation,  of  com- 
munion with  God,  and  of  eternal  life,  then  it 


The  Arian  Crisis  131 

must  be  the  religion  of  the  incarnation;  and  if 
so,  the  men  who  saved  that  religion  in  the  Arian 
crisis  wrought  a  work  of  permanent  value  for 
the  human  race. 

At  an  early  stage  in  the  proceedings  Eusebius 
of  Nicomedia  drew  up  an  Arian  creed  which  was 
read  by  his  namesake  of  Csesarea,  probably  as 
president.  Unfortunately,  we  have  no  copy  of 
this  creed.  But  we  know  that  it  was  instantly 
rejected;  in  fact,  Eusebius  was  not  allowed  to 
read  it  through,  but  it  was  snatched  out  of  his 
hand  and  torn  in  pieces.^  This  seems  to 
show  that  in  A.  D.  325  the  Church  was  in 
no  mood  to  accept  Arianism.  In  fact,  the  con- 
vinced Arians  and  convinced  Athanasians  were 
in  a  minority  in  the  council,  but  the  latter  by 
sheer  power  of  personality,  of  reasoning,  of  logic, 
and  of  Christian  feeling  won  over  the  larger 
crowd,  who  were  either  Origenists  or  indifferent. 
If  there  had  been  a  larger  number  of  bishops 
from  the  West  in  the  council,  the  contest  would 
not  have  lasted  so  long. 

As  the  Arian  creed  was  rejected,  Eusebius  of 
Caesar ea  at  length  brought  forward  a  creed  which 
as  neither  distinctly  Arian  nor  Athanasian  he 
thought  might  be  a  basis  for  united  action.  He 
called  it  "our  symbol";  and  he  says  that  he 
learned  it  from  the  Scriptures,  that  he  received 
it  from  the  bishops  who  preceded  him,  and  that 

» Theodoret,  i,  6. 


132  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

it  was  the  basis  of  instruction  in  the  Church 
(Theodoret  i,  11.)  ^    It  reads  as  follows : 

We  believe  in  the  one  God  Almighty  Father,  the  creator  of 
all  things  visible  and  invisible,  and  in  the  one  Lord  Jesus  Christ, 
the  Logos  of  God,  God  from  God,  Light  from  Light,  Life  from 
Life,  the  only  begotten  Son,  the  firstborn  of  all  creation,  begot- 
ten from  God  the  Father  before  all  times  [aluvuv].  By  him  have 
all  things  become,  who  for  our  salvation  became  flesh,  and  hved 
among  men,  who  suffered,  on  the  third  day  rose  from  the  dead, 
who  went  up  to  his  Father,  and  will  come  again  in  glory  to 
judge  quick  and  dead.  We  beheve  also  in  the  Holy  Spirit. 
Even  so  we  beUeve  that  each  one  has  his  own  being,  that  the 
Father  is  really  Father,  the  Son  really  Son,  the  Holy  Spirit 
really  Holy  Spirit,  as  our  Lord  in  sending  out  his  disciples  to 
preach  also  said,  Go  forth  and  make  disciples  of  aU  peoples 
through  baptism  in  the  name  of  the  Father  and  of  the  Son  and 
of  the  Holy  Ghost.  And  we  are  determined  so  to  hold  and  so 
to  think,  and  to  remain  faithful  in  this  faith  until  death,  as  we 
also  anathematize  every  godless  heresy. 

Now,  outside  of  all  these  Nicene  controver- 
sies, this  is  a  pretty  stiff  creed.  Unitarians  to- 
day would  abominate  it,  the  semi-Unitarians  in 
our  orthodox  Churches  could  not  abide  it,  and 
no  Ritschlian  in  the  world  could  sign  it.  It 
would  create  fearful  dismay  if  read  in  a  Liberal 
Religious  Congress.  To  call  Christ  the  Logos  of 
God,  God  of  God,  Light  of  Light,  Life  of  Life, 
the  only  begotten  Son,  as  the  middle  party  were 
willing  to  do,  is  to  call  him  all  that  one  can  call 


» The  text  of  this  creed  and  of  its  enlarged  form  as  adopted  by 
the  Council  will  be  found  in  the  appendix  to  Athanasius's  De  Decretis, 
and  in  the  Church  Histories  of  Socrates,  i,  8,  Theodoret  i,  11,  etc. 
See  notes  of  Hahn  to  both,  Bihliothek  der  Symbde  und  Glavbensregdn, 
3  Aufl.,  1897,  §§  123,  142. 


The  Arian  Crisis  133 

him.  It  is  a  Trinitarian  confession  through  and 
through.  In  the  light  of  that,  the  other  expres- 
sions that  have  an  Arian  look  may  be  interpreted. 
"The  firstborn  of  all  creatures''  is  a  scriptural 
expression  (Col.  1.  15;  compare  Heb.  1.  5,  6)  and 
refers  to  the  incarnation,  foreordained  in  the 
very  dawn  of  creation.  "Begotten  of  the  Father 
before  all  aeons"  may  refer  to  Christ's  sonship 
as  in  thought  looking  forward  from  eternity  to 
the  incarnation,  or  it  may  be  simply  an  equiva- 
lent for  "in  eternity,"  as  before  time  is  eternity. 

Still  the  Arians  were  ready  with  their  inter- 
pretations, and  as  they  seemed  to  be  willing  to 
accept  that  creed— probably  to  stave  off  some- 
thing worse — the  Athanasians  were  in  a  quan- 
dary. They  were  willing  to  accept  the  creed  of 
Eusebius,  but  they  must  introduce  a  few  changes 
so  as  to  exclude  all  possibility  of  error.  They 
also  wanted  to  add  two  or  three  things  not  given 
in  the  Csesarea  creed,  so  as  to  make  assurance 
doubly  sure  against  Arius:  (1)  They  were  anx- 
ious to  put  in,  "who  is  from  the  essence  (or 
"being"  ohaia^)  of  the  Father";  (2)  they  added 
"begotten,  not  made";  and  (3)  they  clinched  the 
whole  thing  by  the  words,  "of  the  same  essence 
with  the  Father"  (bfioovmov  tg)  Trarpt).  Now,  all 
these  three  additions  were  really  included  in  the 
original  "God  from  God,  only  begotten  Son," 
etc.,  but  for  fear  the  Arians  did  not  think  so  the 
Athanasians  were  bound  to  have  them  in. 


134  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

But  these  strong  characters  who  were  fighting 
the  battles  of  the  divine  Christ  against  Arius  at 
that  council  were  not  even  content  with  these 
explicit  declarations,  though  they  might  well 
have  been  content.  For  the  victor  to  press  his 
foe  too  hardly  may  cause  a  reaction,  may  hasten 
returning  sympathies.  To  carry  your  views  to 
their  farthest  analysis,  and  then  to  stuff  all  your 
inferences  down  your  opponent's  throat,  may  be 
stalwart  orthodoxy,  but  it  may  have  conse- 
quences that  will  return  to  plague  you.  At  the 
same  time  it  is  fair  to  say  that  the  slipperiness 
of  the  Arians  in  seeming  willing  to  accept  strong 
expressions  of  Christ's  divinity,  which  they  in- 
terpreted in  a  way  suitable  to  themselves,  made 
the  stalwart  party  determined  to  exclude  their 
view  (Athanasius,  Ad  Afros,  5).  At  any  rate, 
the  Athanasians  not  only  insisted  on  the  above 
additions,  but  they  added  a  list  of  the  Arian 
errors,  ending  with  an  anathema  upon  them — 
fateful  anathema!  Thus  revised  and  enlarged 
the  Eusebian  confession  was  made  the  Nicene 
Creed,  the  first  great  deliberately  formed  creed 
in  history,  and  it  was  as  follows : 

We  believe  in  the  one  God  Almighty  Father,  the  creator  of 
all  things  visible  and  invisible,  and  in  the  one  Lord  Jesus  Christ 
the  Son  of  God,  the  one  only  begotten  from  the  Father,  and 
from  the  substance  [ovaiaq]  of  the  Father,  God  from  God, 
Light  from  Light,  true  God  from  true  God,  begotten  not  made, 
of  one  substance  with  the  Father  [bfioovciov  tgJ  Trarpt],  through 
whom  all  things  exist  [have  become],  which  are  in  heaven  and 


The  Arian  Crisis  135 

which  are  on  earth,  who  for  us  men  and  our  salvation  came 
down  and  became  flesh,  took  on  the  form  of  a  man,  suffered, 
and  on  the  third  day  rose  from  the  dead,  and  went  up  into 
heaven,  and  comes  to  judge  hving  and  dead,  and  in  the  Holy 
Spirit.  Those  who  say.  There  was  when  he  was  not,  or.  He  waa 
not  before  he  was  begotten,  or.  He  was  made  out  of  nothing 
[ef  ovK  6vr(ov  kyivsTol  or,  He  was  begotten  out  of  another 
substance  or  essence,  or,  The  Son  of  God  [is  created  or]  is  change- 
able or  alterable— these  the  Catholic  [and  apostolic]  Church 
anathematizes. 

Now,  the  remarkable  thing  is  that  this  strong 
Athanasian  Creed  won  the  assent  of  nearly  every 
member  of  the  council.  Only  two  men  stood  by 
Arius  and  refused  to  sign  ( one  account  says  five, 
of  whom  two  repented  and  signed).  Why  this 
success  of  the  right  wing?  This  question  is  the 
more  interesting  as  Constantine  is  sometimes 
credited  with  forcing  the  matter  through  against 
the  reluctant  will  of  the  Council.  "The  imperial 
will,"  says  Professor  Karl  Miiller,  "bent  almost 
the  whole  Council,  even  the  Lucianists.''^  Heussi 
echoes  this  {''unter  dem  Druck  des  Kaisers'').^ 
Loofs  will  not  commit  himself  thus,  but  says 
simply  unter  ahendldndischen  Einfluss.^  Deutsch 
says  the  same,  mentioning  Hosius  in  particular.^ 
Let  us  look,  then,  at  the  forces  which  led  to  the 
result  of  A.  D.  325. 

1.  The  fact  that  the  middle  party  became  con- 
vinced that  their  creed  (see  above)  was  in  agree- 
ment with  these  Athanasian  additions  and  re- 

^  Kirchengeschichte,  vol.  i  (1892),  p.  182.       2 Ibid.,  1907,  p.  110. 
8  Ibid.,  1901,  p.  29.  4  Ibid.,  1909,  p.  157. 


136  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

quired  them  for  its  proper  explanation.  This 
comes  out  in  Eusebius  of  Csesarea's  letter  of  ex- 
planation to  his  church.^  This  letter  shows  the 
deliberation  and  discussion  which  these  additions 
received  and  the  fact  that  they  were  accepted 
only  because  they  were  the  fair  inference  of  their 
own  faith,  which,  in  fact,  they  were  ( "We  received 
them,"  says  Eusebius,  "when  in  mature  delibera- 
tion we  examined  the  sense  of  his  words,  and 
they  appeared  to  agree  with  what  we  had  origi- 
nally proposed  as  a  sound  confession'').  The 
remark  about  forcing  one's  inferences  upon 
others  must  not  lead  us  to  suppose  that  the  center 
were  precipitately  induced  against  their  will  to 
receive  the  additions.  On  the  contrary,  the 
sources  show  their  calm  deliberation  and  their 
ultimate  and  voluntary  conviction  of  the  truth 
of  those  additions.  The  Origenists  were  in  the 
half-way  house  to  the  Athanasians,  and  they 
must  either  go  backward  or  forward.  Their  re- 
luctance to  follow  the  logical  implications  of 
their  creed  was  their  dread  of  Sabellianism  and 
their  dread  of  losing  the  historic  Jesus,  and  they 
did  well  to  dread  both. 

2.  The  profound  religious  interest  which  cen- 
tered in  the  Athanasian  view.  The  Arians  had  a 
cosmology,  and  their  view  (really  semi-Gnostic) 
fitted  admirably  into  it.  But  they  had  no  soteri- 
ology,  no  philosophy  of  salvation.     But  Atha- 

^  Socrates,  Hisioria  Ecclesiastica,  1,  8. 


The  Arian  Crisis  137 

nasius's  theology  was  built  on  the  background  of 
Calvary.  It  was  interwoven  with  his  soteriology. 
It  is  necessary  to  religion,  he  argued,  that  an 
actual  real  connection  or  union  should  exist  be- 
tween man  and  God,  between  heaven  and  earth. 
There  is  no  help  for  us  in  a  God  who  is  over  us  in 
a  vast  universe,  without  taking  hold  of  us.  If 
we  should  express  the  faith  truly,  we  must  de- 
clare the  actual  incarnation  of  God,  that  Jesus 
Christ  really  went  out  from  the  highest  Lord  of 
the  heavens.  Only  then  can  we  be  confident  in 
our  redemption.  It  was  the  feeling  of  Atha- 
nasius — and  he  evidently  made  all  his  party  feel 
it  also — that  the  very  existence  of  Christianity 
as  a  religion  of  redemption  was  bound  up  with 
the  acknowledgment  of  Christ  as  truly  divine. 
History  has  shown  that  in  this  he  was  right.  If 
the  first  step  is  a  letting-down  of  Jesus's  divinity, 
the  second  step  is  bound  to  be  an  explaining  away 
of  his  atonement.  It  was  this  tremendous  re- 
ligious interest — "for  us  men  and  our  salvation" 
— of  the  right  wing  which  made  them  victorious 
at  Nicaea. 

"It  was  not  for  a  word  or  a  formula,"  says 
Harnack  finelv/  "that  Athanasius  was  con- 
cerned,  but  a  crucial  thought  of  his  faith,  the 
redemption  and  raising  of  humanity  to  divine 
life  through  the  God-man.  It  was  only  from  the 
certainty  that  the  divinity  manifest  in  Jesus 

i  History  of  Dogma,  vol.  lii,  pp.  140,  141. 


138  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

Christ  possessed  the  nature  of  Deity  (unity  of 
being),  and  was  on  this  account  alone  in  a  posi- 
tion to  raise  us  to  a  divine  life,  that  faith  was  to 
receive  its  strength,  life  its  law,  and  theology 
its  direction.  .  .  .  Behind  and  beside  him  existed 
a  speculation  which  led  on  a  shoreless  sea,  and 
the  ship  was  in  danger  of  losing  its  helm.  He 
grasped  the  rudder."  Harnack,  indeed,  says 
later  (vol.  iv,  p.  49)  that  while  the  result  at 
Nicsea  "saved  the  religious  conviction  that  Chris- 
tianity is  the  religion  of  perfect  fellowship  with 
God,"  as  over  against  a  "doctrine  which  had  no 
understanding  of  the  inner  essence  of  religion," 
the  Nicene  issue  "sacrificed  the  historical 
Christ."  This  was  not  only  not  so,  but  it  saved 
the  historical  Christ,  him  whom  the  genuine 
records  of  history  describe  as  not  only  Son  of 
man  but  also  Son  of  God.  Besides,  if  Chris- 
tianity was  to  be  preserved  as  a  religion  of  re- 
demption, of  salvation  from  sin,  no  other  result 
could  have  been  reached. 

3.  It  was  a  tribute  to  personality.  Eusebius 
of  Nicomedia  was  not  a  strong  character,  did 
not  have  a  single  eye,  or  he  would  not  have  drawn 
up  an  Arian  creed  and  at  length  signed  an  Atha- 
nasian  one.  The  head  of  the  middle  wing,  Euse- 
bius of  Csesarea,  was  a  cultured  and  learned  man, 
but  he  had,  like  Erasmus,  the  scholar's  mind,  not 
the  theologian's,  and  his  whole  inner  nature,  his 
religious  experience,  was  not  so  absorbed  in  his 


The  Arian  Crisis  139 

Christology  that  he  felt  he  must  stand  by  one 
view  rather  than  by  another.  He  was,  therefore, 
really  open  to  conviction  from  the  Athanasian 
side.  I  have  already  said  that  the  mass  of  the 
council  were  men  either  open  to  conviction  from 
the  strongest  arguments  or  to  pressure  from  the 
strongest  arm.  It  is  not  necessary  to  say  who 
possessed  the  arguments. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  Athanasians  had  men  of 
positive  influence.  Athanasius  himself,  in  the 
conferences  of  his  party  and  in  the  outside  meet- 
ings and  casual  debates  with  the  middle  and  left 
wings,  must  have  exercised  an  enormous  influ- 
ence. In  the  council  itself  there  was  Eustathius 
of  Antioch,  a  great  and  notable  man.  There  was 
Alexander  of  Alexandria,  who  was  no  mean  an- 
tagonist, but  a  clear,  strong  thinker.  There  was 
Marcellus  of  Ancyra,  who  was  a  man  of  iron  will 
and  immense  power  of  resistance,  whose  presence 
among  the  Athanasians  meant  a  good  deal. 
There  was  Hosius  of  Cordova,  an  intimate  friend 
of  the  emperor,  who  possessed  power  in  concilia- 
tion and  persuasion,  and  who  well  supplemented 
the  theological  work  of  his  colleagues  with  his 
diplomatic  and  skillful  mediations  and  explana- 
tions.* A  doctrine  that  could  train  and  inspire 
men  like  these  deserves  to  win. 

^  The  Arians  are  later  represented  as  ascribing  immense  influence 
to  Hosius  in  this  matter.  See  Athanasius,  Historia  Arianorum,  §  42. 
"He  put  forth  the  faith  in  Nicaea,"  they  are  supposed  to  say,  though 

as  remarkpH  Vtv  T^nnfa.    Jlnnmpnnfisrhrr.hfp..  4   Aiifl^  n.  541.  nnf.  rifrhi.lv. 


140         Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

4.  The  Athanasian  party  were  not  only  con- 
vinced, but  they  were  united,  and  this,  with  the 
additional  fact  that  they  possessed  the  apostolic 
seats — Jerusalem,  Antioch,  Alexandria  (tradi- 
tionally Saint  Mark's),  Rome,  etc.— must  have  at 
length  made  an  impression  on  the  majority  arid 
on  the  emperor. 

5.  This  leads  me  to  say  that  another  reason  for 
the  Athanasian  victory  was  the  convincing  of  the 
assembly  that  the  older  and  sounder  tradition 
was  on  that  side.  Eusebius  says  that  he  "did 
well  to  assent"  to  the  idea  that  Christ  was  one 
in  essence  with  the  Father  because  "we  were 
aware  that  even  among  the  ancients  some  learned 
and  illustrous  bishops  and  writers  have  used  the 
term  ^one  in  essence,'  in  their  theological  teach- 
ings concerning  the  Father  and  the  Son."^  Har- 
nack  agrees  with  this,  and  says  (vol.  iii,  pp.  141, 
142)  that  "there  was  nothing  new  in  the  common 
sense  of  the  word"  in  Athanasius's  views;  "he 
had  really  on  his  side  the  best  part  of  the  tradi- 
tion of  the  Church.  New  alone  was  the  fact,  the 
energy  and  exclusiveness  of  his  view  and  action 
at  a  time  when  everything  threatened  to  undoing 
and  dissolution." 

6.  The  emperor.     We  cannot  eliminate  him 
from  the  victory  at  Nicsea.    He  was  not  mainly 


1  See  his  epistle  to  his  church  in  Caesarea  in  appendix  to  Athanasius, 
De  Decretis,  and  compare  Athanasius's  own  statements  as  to  "testi- 
mony from  their  fathers,  ancient  bishops,"  etc.,  in  Ad  Afros,  6. 


The  Arian  Crisis  141 

responsible,  but  he  was  in  part  responsible.    "He 
advised  all  present  to  agree  to''  the  C^esarean 
creed,  says  Eusebius,  and  in  his  Life  of  Constan- 
tine  (bk.iii,  ch.  13)  he,  doubtless  with  a  courtier's 
exaggeration,  makes  him  alone  responsible  for 
the  final  unanimity,  "urging  all  to  unity  of  senti- 
ment,  until  at  last  he  succceeded  in  bringing  them 
to  one  mind  and  judgment  respecting  every  dis- 
puted question."    But  why  did  the  emperor  come 
over  to  the  right  wing,  when  with  his  paganism 
and  his  court  influences  at  Nicomedia  he  would 
naturally  have  been  borne  toward  Arius?    His 
conversion  is  to  be  explained.    Was  it  his  homage 
to  strength,  his  feeling  that  the  men  on  the  right 
had  the  deepest  convictions,  and  that  finally  these 
convictions  thus  strongly  held  by  the  strongest 
men  must  eventually  prevail?    Was  it  a  dim  per- 
ception that,  after  all,  the  arguments  of  Alexan- 
der's party  were  the  more  convincing,  and  that 
Christianity  to  be  a  winning  religion  over  against 
paganism  must  have  an  absolutely  divine  Saviour 
and  Lord?    His  own  letter  to  the  Alexandrians 
after  the  Council  (Socrates,  i,  9)  shows  that  the 
almost  unanimous  decision  of  so  many  impressed 
him  deeply    ("For  that  which  has  commended 
itself  to  the  judgment  of  three  hundred  bishops 
cannot  be  other  than  the  judgment  of  God,"  he 
says ;  "seeing  that  the  Holy  Spirit  dwelling  in  the 
minds  of  so  many  dignified  persons  has  effectu- 
ally enlightened  them"). 


142  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

Bernoulli^  says  that  for  their  victory  the  Atha- 
nasians  must  thank  their  own  energy.  But  he 
also  says  that  the  victory  was  due  in  part  to  a 
successful  intrigue.  When  we  come,  however, 
to  specifications  as  to  what  the  intrigue  was  we 
are  left  in  the  dark.  He  accuses  the  Athanasians 
of  two  things :  ( 1 )  Of  cutting  out  the  biblical  for- 
mulas from  the  Caesarean  symbol,  and  in  their 
place  setting  in  theological  statements  which 
guaranteed  the  exclusion  of  Arianism  in  the 
sharpest  way.  But  if  these  biblical  expressions 
were  used  unbiblically  to  teach  unbiblical  doc- 
trines, and  if  the  Athanasians  must  preserve  at 
all  hazards  the  actual  deity  of  Jesus,  were  they 
to  blame  for  insisting  on  their  own  formulas? 
(2)  Of  using  their  influence  on  the  emperor  for 
the  victory  of  their  side.  This,  he  says,  was  their 
intrigue.  But  nothing  further  is  alleged.  He 
does  not  say  they  used  their  influence  badly  or 
unfairly.  The  emperor  had  to  decide  for  some 
side.  The  fact  that  he  did  not  decide  for  the  side 
he  would  naturally  have  favored  speaks  for 
stronger  reasons  on  the  side  that  prevailed.  "It 
was  not  necessity  which  drove  the  judges  to  their 
decision,"  says  Athanasius^  "but  all  vindicated 
the  truth  from  deliberate  purpose.'' 

It  is  the  custom  long  since  to  decry  the  historic 
creeds  and  to  depreciate  the  men  who  made  them. 


1  Herzog-Hauck,  3  Aufl.,  vol.  xiv  (1904),  p.  15. 

2  Epistola  ad  ^gyptos,  13. 


The  Arian  Crisis  143 

Certainly,  all  will  admit  that  the  appealing  and 
binding  power  of  the  creed  is  its  truth  alone, 
which  truth  must  not  be  burdened  with  the  meth- 
ods of  its  advocates.    At  the  same  time  this  must 
be  said :  speaking  after  the  manner  of  men,  the 
Nicene  Council  and  Creed  saved  the  Christian 
religion.     At  that   council   two   conceptions   of 
Christianity  were  in  a  death  struggle ;  one  that  a 
created  mediator  was  given  to  help  men,  the  other 
that  the  eternal  Son  of  God  himself  was  incar- 
nated to  redeem  men  and  to  unite  men  and  God. 
One  gives  an  ethical  religion,  a  finer  Stoicism, 
a  Gnostic  demiurge-theosophy,  which  would  have 
been  utterly  helpless  in  the  storms  that  were  to 
come;  the  other  is  the  religion  of  the  incarnation, 
of  redemption,   of  salvation   through   faith,   of 
eternal  life  in  the  Eternal  Son.    The  parties  in 
that  struggle  at  the  bottom  were  two  only,  the 
Arians   and  the  Athanasians,   and  it  was  the 
great  service  of  the  latter  that  they  stuck  to 
their  guns  until  they  carried  the  middle  party, 
whose  deeper  principles  they  saw  logically  led  to 
their  own  views,  made  that  party  see  that  such 
was  the  case,  and  brought  almost  every  man  of 
them  to  their  own  Csesarean  creed  as  now  first 
logically   expressed.      But   would   it   not   have 
been  better  to  do  that  by  argument,  by  the  force 
of  truth  itself,  without  a  council  and  creed,  and 
especially  without  the  ingripping  of  the  State 
on  religious  matters,  with  its  disastrous  conse- 


144  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

quences?  Doubtless.  But  that  method  was  then 
historically  impossible.  To  the  fact  that  the  be- 
lievers in  the  deity  of  Christ  fought  their  fight  at 
that  council  as  God  gave  them  opportunity  we 
owe  it  to-day  that  Christianity  exists,  not  alone 
on  ancient  records,  but  as  a  regnant  and  regener- 
ating force  in  humanity. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

The  Catholic  Change:  or^,  Will  Christianity 
Eemain  a  Spiritual  Religion? 

In  closing  this  discussion  of  early  Church 
crises  a  word  should  be  said  on  what  was  not  a 
crisis  in  the  usual  sense,  on  a  movement  that  did 
not  have  a  turning  point  or  critical  moment,  but 
proceeded  so  gradually,  so  insensibly,  so  inevi- 
tably as  almost  to  be  unnoticed,  as  almost  to 
awaken  no  protest,  but  which  was,  nevertheless, 
one  of  the  most  momentous  changes,  one  of  the 
most  revolutionary  transformations  ever  known 
in  the  history  of  religion. 

First,  as  to  doctrine.  I  suppose  the  essence  of 
primitive  Christianity  might  be  expressed  in  the 
classic  passage :  God  so  loved  the  world,  that  he 
gave  his  only  begotten  Son,  that  whosoever  be- 
lieveth  in  him  should  not  perish,  but  have  eternal 
life  (John  3.  16).  There  was  hardly  a  congrega- 
tion throughout  the  Roman  empire  in  the  first 
century  and  first  half  of  the  second  which  could 
not  have  said  on  the  recitation  of  this  text,  "Yes, 
that  is  our  creed;  by  that  we  stand  or  fall."  But 
that  morning  soon  passed.  The  sacraments  be- 
gan to  practically  take  the  place  of  faith.  Bap- 
tism came  to  be  looked  upon  as  a  regenerating 

145 


146         Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

rite,  instead  of  the  symbol  of  a  cleansing  already 
received  through  faith.    The  Lord's  Supper  was 
changed   from    a   memorial   meal   or    dinner — 
whether  in  the  family  or  in  the  society— in  honor 
of  Christ  to  a  solemn  ritualistic  service  in  which 
by   a   certain   transformation   in   the   elements 
Christ  was  supposed  to  enter  the  communicant 
in  order  to  impart  to  his  body  immortality  and 
to  his  soul  peace.    Instead  of  being  a  sorrow  for 
sin  and  an  inner  attitude  toward  it,  penitence 
came  to  be,  rather,  an  external  relation  to  the 
Church,  whether  to  the  prophet  or  (later)  to  the 
bishop.     Instead  of  the  penitent  being  charged 
simply  to  live  a  life  of  faith  and  righteousness, 
various  arbitrary  duties  and  tests  were  imposed 
upon  him.     Instead  of  Christianity  being  con- 
ceived as  a  new  life  springing  from  faith  in 
Christ,  it  came  to  be  conceived  as  a  new  philoso- 
phy or  new  morality.    As  Von  Schubert  says,* 
Christianity  took  as  compared  with  Paul  a  de- 
cidedly legalistic  turn,  of  course  not  Jewish  legal- 
istic but  moral  legalistic.    In  the  moral  concep- 
tion there  worked  also  an  ascetic  world-fleeing  in- 
clination to  purity,  a  fighting  of  the  sensuous, 
especially  of  sexual  pleasure,  of  worldly  posses- 
sions, etc.,  while  at  the  same  time  the  mighty 
commandment  of  love  worked  among  Christians 
to  love  of  the  enemy  as  well  as  to  brother  love. 
There  followed  also  self-denial,  peacefulness,  hu- 

» In  Moeller,  Kirchengeschichte,  1902,  vol.  I,  pp.  129,  130. 


The  Catholic  Change  147 

mility  and  patience,  as  well  as  a  constant  readi- 
ness in  benevolence  encouraged  by  the  expecta- 
tion of  future  glory.  These  moral  demands  were 
placed  over  against  sins  as  the  way  of  life  over 
against  the  way  of  death  (Didache,  chapters  1-6), 
and  were  enjoined  on  the  baptized.  Instead  of 
the  simple  confession  of  Christ  expressed  or 
understood  as  the  only  condition  of  baptism,^ 
moral  prescriptions  were  placed  upon  the  candi- 
date: "Having  first  taught  all  these  things  [all 
moral  things],  baptize  ye,"  etc.  (Didache  7.  1). 
"Those  who  become  convinced,"  says  Justin 
(  /  Apologia,  61) ,  "and  believe  that  the  things  we 
teach  are  true,  and  promise  to  live  according  to 
them,  are  instructed  to  pray  to  and  to  entreat 
God  with  fasting  [compare  the  probable  inser- 
tion of  "fasting''  by  later  scribes,  perhaps  think- 
ing it  had  been  omitted  by  copyist,  in  Matt.  17. 
21  and  Mark  9.  29]  for  the  remission  of  their  sins 
that  are  past,  we  praying  and  fasting  with  them. 
Then  they  are  brought  to  where  there  is  water 
and  are  regenerated,"  etc.  In  the  vision  of  Her- 
raas  those  who  "fall  near  the  waters  and  cannot 
roll  into  the  waters — wouldest  thou  know  who 
they  are?  They  are  they  that  heard  the  word, 
and  would  be  baptized  into  the  name  of  the  Lord 
(because  your  life  is  saved  and  shall  be  saved  by 
water,  3.  3).  Then  when  they  call  to  their  re- 
membrance the  purity  of  the  truth  they  change 

1  Compare  Acts  8.  36,  38,  and  spurious  37  found  only  in  one  uncial 


148  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

their  minds,  and  go  back  again  to  their  evil  de- 
sires."^ 

I  do  not  refer  to  the  Eule  of  Faith  as  a  Catholic 
evolution,  though  it  was  so  in  a  real  sense,  be- 
cause the  content  of  that  rule,  as  it  expressed  it- 
self, say,  in  what  we  call  the  Apostles'  Creed, 
especially  in  its  earliest  forms,  was  primitive. 
There  is  nothing  in  that  creed  but  what  might  be 
repeated  from  the  heart  by  the  most  evangelical 
Christian,  of  course  placing  his  own  interpreta- 
tion on  the  later  word  "Catholic,"  which  inter- 
pretation would  be  very  likely  not  that  of  those 
who  inserted  it  there.  It  is,  indeed,  true  that  the 
use  of  a  distinct  creed  as  a  test  of  orthodoxy  was 
a  characteristic  of  the  ancient  Catholic  Church, 
as  opposed  to  the  primitive  Church,  where  a 
free  life  led  by  the  Spirit,  with  spiritual  guides, 
prophetic  communications  and  apostolic  coun- 
sels, could  not  be  bound  by  an  external  yoke. 
But  for  all  that,  there  were  undoubtedly  brief 
statements  of  the  common  faith  used  in  the  con- 
gregations, of  which  1  Cor.  15.  3;  Heb.  4.  4; 
10.  23 ;  1  Pet.  3.  2 ;  1  Tim.  6.  12,  are  echoes,  and 
which  probably  assumed  a  Trinitarian  form 
(compare  Eph.  2.  19,  20;  4.  4-6;  5.  19;  2  Thess. 
2.  13;  Jude  20;  1  Pet.  1.  2,  etc.^  The  younger 
Seeberg  has  given  a  thorough  discussion  of  al- 
leged materials  for  catechetical  instruction  in 


1  Shepherd,  Vision  3.7. 

2  See  Seeberg,  History  of  Doctrine,  i,  36-38. 


The  Catholic  Change  149 

the  primitive  documents.^    He  says  in  his  Pref- 
ace: "In  this  book  I  hope  I  have  brought  for- 
ward the  proof  that  soon  after  the  death  of  Christ 
a  catechism  arose  formed  out  of  the  words  of  the 
Lord.    The  content  of  the  same  was  preached  by 
the  missionaries  in  the  apostolic  age,  and  taught 
to  those  who  desired  to  receive  Christian  baptism. 
I  have  been  able  to  make  sure  the  chief  pieces  of 
this  catechism,  and  where  it  was  possible  to  con- 
struct   with    more   or    less   certainty   the   very 
words."    I  give  no  opinion  here  as  to  the  correct- 
ness of  these  results.    As  the  years  wore  on,  the 
controversy   with    Gnosticism   made   absolutely 
necessary  the  fixing  of  reliable  norms  of  doctrine 
and  limits  of  the  New  Testament  canon. 

In  regard  to  Church  organization  and  officers, 
the  Catholic  evolution  froze  the  fluidity  of  the 
apostolic  times.  As  late  as  the  The  Teaching  of 
the  Ttcelve  Apostles  (perhaps  A.  D.  125)  we  find 
apostles  not  swallowed  up  in  bishops,  as  Catholic 
theory  presupposes,  but  still  existing  side  by  side 
with  bishops  (or  presbyters),  with  full  rights, 
but  with  privileges  of  continued  stay  in  one  place 
and  of  money  support  much  curtailed  (11.  3-6). 
If  with  the  Muratonian  Canon  (about  A.  D.  175) 
we  place  the  Shepherd  of  Hermas  at  about  A.  D. 
150,  we  have  prophets  still  in  full  blast. 

How  then,  sir,  say  I,  shall  a  man  know  who  of  them  is  a 
prophet  and  who  is  a  false  prophet?    Hear,  saith  he,  concerning 

1  Der  Katechismus  der  Urchristenheit,  Leipzig,  1903. 


150         Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

both  the  prophets;  and  as  I  shall  tell  thee  so  shalt  thou  test  the 
prophet  and  the  false  prophet.  By  his  life  test  the  man  that 
hath  the  divine  Spirit.  In  the  first  place,  he  that  hath  the 
Spirit,  which  is  from  above,  is  gentle  and  tranquil  and  humble- 
minded,  abstaineth  from  all  wickedness  and  from  desire  of  this 
present  world,  and  holdeth  himself  inferior  to  all  men,  and  giv- 
eth  no  answer  to  any  man  when  inquired  of  [for  private  selfish 
purposes  of  the  inquirer,  as  with  those  who  consulted  the  heathen 
oracles],  nor  speaketh  in  sohtude  [but  only  in  the  congregation], 
for  neither  does  the  Holy  Spirit  speak  when  a  man  wisheth  him 
to  speak.  When,  then,  the  man  who  hath  the  divine  Spirit 
Cometh  into  an  assembly  of  the  righteous  men  who  have  faith 
in  a  divine  Spirit,  and  intercession  is  made  to  God  by  the  gath- 
ering of  these  men,  then  the  angel  of  the  prophetic  spirit,  who 
is  attached  to  him,  filleth  the  man,  and  the  man  being  filled 
with  the  Holy  Spirit  speaketh  to  the  multitude  according  as 
the  Lord  willeth.  In  this  way,  then,  the  Spirit  of  the  Deity  shall 
be  manifest.  This,  then,  is  the  greatness  of  the  power  as  touch- 
ing the  Spirit  of  the  Deity  of  the  Lord.^ 

But  not  only  had  these  charismatic  or  miracu- 
lously endowed  oflScers  not  yet  given  way  before 
the  crushing  power  of  the  rising  bishops,  these 
bishops  themselves  are  in  Hermas  not  yet  dis- 
criminated from  presbyters  or  elders.  The  presi- 
dents of  the  Churches  are  the  elders  {Vision  2. 
4)  who  are  the  first  to  take  their  seats  (3. 1) ,  and 
when  the  "squared  and  white  stones  that  fit  to- 
gether in  their  joints"  are  mentioned  (3.  5),  they 
are  said  to  be  the  "apostles  and  bishops  and 
teachers  and  deacons,"  where  the  old  position  of 
things  as  to  identity  or  parity  of  presbyters  and 
bishops  is  presupposed.  All  this  goes  to  show 
what  we  learn  from  other  sources  that  well  along 

1  Hennas,  Shepherd,  Mandate  11,  Lightfoot's  tr. 


The  Catholic  Change  151 

toward  the  middle  of  the  second  century  the 
bishop  as  an  office  of  rule  distinct  from  the  pres- 
byter (the  monarchical  episcopate)  did  not  exist 
in  Rome.    But  forces  were  driving  the  Church  to 
an  hierarchical  organization,  such  as  the  neces- 
sity of  some  one  to  represent  the  Church  over 
against   irresponsible   wandering   prophets   and 
evangelists,   heretical   teachers,   parties   formed 
within  the  Church  itself,  as  authoritative  witness- 
es of  genuine  doctrinal  tradition,  all  of  which 
was  helped  by  the  decay  of  vital  piety  and  the 
naturalization  of  the  Church  in  a  world  whence 
the  Lord  had  departed,  not  soon — as  it  now  ap- 
peared—to return.    Citizenship  in  heaven  (Phil. 
3.  20)  is  not  enough.    We  must  build  the  city  of 
God  upon  earth,  and  to  do  that  gradations  of 
officers,  as  in  worldly  monarchy,  are  necessary. 
The  apostolic  democracy  of  a  priesthood  of  be- 
lievers had  departed. 

Priesthood  of  believers,  I  say.  One  of  the  most 
significant  achievements  of  the  Catholic  leaven 
was  the  transformation  of  the  clergy  from  min- 
isters to  priests.  But  it  was  not  accomplished  in 
a  day.  Clement  of  Rome  at  the  close  of  the  first 
century  is  a  stickler  for  order,  and  he  wants  lay- 
men to  keep  their  place,  but  it  is  evident  that  he 
does  not  consider  ministers  priests  in  the  proper 
(that  is,  Catholic)  sense.  Ignatius  (A.  D.  110- 
117),  though  he  lauds  the  threefold  office  of 
bishop,  presbyter,  and  deacon  to  the  skies,  does 


152  Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

not  look  upon  them  as  priests.  The  philosopher 
Justin  (about  A.  D.  135-160)  knows  no  special 
priesthood  of  the  clergy.  In  fact,  a  Roman  Cath- 
olic scholar  has  shown  that  it  is  not  till  Irenaeus 
(A.  D.  160-180)  that  we  get  anything  like  sacri- 
ficial ideas  in  the  so-called  Catholic  sense  in  con- 
nection with  the  Eucharist,  and  then  only  in  the 
Invocation  or  Consecration,  and  that  merely 
symbolical,  as  desiring  to  express  the  offering  of 
the  body  and  blood  as  gifts  to  God.^  He  has 
shown  also  that  there  were  no  altars  in  churches 
till  the  first  part  of  the  third  century,  when  they 
were  regarded  with  reverence  only  while  the 
Supper  service  was  going  on,  after  which  they 
were  simply  tables.  It  is  only  in  the  time  of  Con- 
stantine  (sole  emperor  A.  D.  324-337)  that  the 
altar  has  any  permanent  religious  significance.^ 
But  even  earlier  than  that,  by  the  time  of  Cyprian 
(A.  D.  250),  the  theory  of  a  regular  priesthood 
of  ministers  had  strongly  asserted  itself,  a  theory 
which  I  must  believe  one  of  the  most  false  and 
pernicious  for  which  Catholicism  in  its  numer- 
ous borrowings  from  Judaism  and  heathenism 
has  ever  been  responsible. 

Striking  also  is  the  transformation  in  Chris- 
tian worship.  So  far  as  we  can  gather  from  the 
New  Testament,  prophets  seemed  to  have  the 


1  Dr.  Franz  Wieland,  Der  vorirenaische  Opferhegriff,  Miinchen,  1909. 
2Wieland,  Mensa   und  Confessio:  Stvdien  iiber  den  Altar  der  chr. 
lAturgie,  Miinchen,  1906. 


The  Catholic  Change  153 

right  of  way  in  the  assemblies.  To  them  the  be- 
lievers must  always  listen  with  attention,  nor,  if 
order  is  preserved,  sit  in  judgment  on  their  mes- 
sage. But  this  did  not  mean  that  other  believers 
were  debarred  from  participation  in  the  worship 
by  prayer,  by  song,  by  exhortation,  by  prophecy, 
for  their  rights  were  carefully  guarded  by  Paul. 
In  fact,  the  service  in  Corinth  reminds  one  of  an 
old-fashioned  Methodist  class  meeting  or,  rather, 
love  feast,  where  all  not  only  partake  of  the  sacra- 
mental symbols  of  brotherhood  and  of  union  with 
Christ,  but  are  also  equally  entitled  to  contribute 
to  the  edification  of  the  meeting,  so  long  as  it  is 
done  without  confusion.  By  the  time  of  the 
DidacJie,  or  Teaching  of  the  Twelve  Apostles  more 
formal  methods  have  been  adopted,  as  a  regular 
prayer  is  given  to  be  used  in  connection  with  the 
eucharistic  dinner,  though  it  is  expressly  stipu- 
lated that  the  prophet  need  have  no  reference  to 
any  such  helps;  and  the  prayer  itself  is  vastly 
different  from  anything  offered  by  the  later 
liturgies  with  their  somber  atmosphere  and  their 
solemn  priestly  tone.  In  fact,  by  the  end  of  the 
first  century  formal  prayers  were  apparently 
used  in  the  Church,  as  in  the  concluding  sections 
of  the  Epistle  of  Clement  of  Rome  to  the  Corin- 
thians (those  sections  discovered  by  Bryennios  in 
the  library  of  the  Holy  Sepulcher,  Fanari,  Con- 
stantinople, in  1873,  and  published  by  him  in 
1875,  the  same  batch  of  manuscript  containing 


154         Crises  in  the  Early  Church 

the  Teaching  mentioned  above,  published  at  the 
end  of  1883),  a  long  prayer  is  inserted  suitable 
for  use  in  worship,  though  no  statement  is  made 
that  it  was  actually  so  used.  According  to  Justin^ 
we  could  reconstruct  a  service  in  his  day  in  this 
order :  I.  Prayers.  II.  Kiss  of  Peace.  III.  Bring- 
ing forward  to  the  presiding  brother  (ro)  Trpoearwrf 
ro)v  adeXdcbv)  bread  and  a  cup  of  wine  mixed  with 
water.  IV.  Thanksgivings  and  prayers  by  him, 
closed  by  Amen  said  in  common.  V.  Distribu- 
tion of  the  bread  and  mixed  wine  by  the  deacons 
to  those  present.  Or,  if  we  take  the  notice  of 
Sunday  worship  in  chapter  67,  in  this  order:  I. 
Reading  of  memoirs  of  apostles  or  writings  of 
prophets  as  long  as  time  permits.  II.  Exhorta- 
tion or  instruction  by  the  president.  III.  Pray- 
ers, congregation  standing.  IV.  The  bringing 
forward  of  bread,  and  wine,  and  water.  V. 
Thanksgivings  and  prayers  by  the  president  "ac- 
cording to  his  ability"  (6ai]  dvvaiiLg  avroj)^  followed 
by  the  Amen  in  common.  VI.  Distribution  of 
the  eatables  to  each  present,  followed  (appar- 
ently after  the  service)  by  the  carrying  of  por- 
tions by  the  deacons  to  the  absent  members.  VII. 
Collection  of  contributions  (apparently  both  in 
money  and  in  kind)  brought  in  by  the  believers. 
Ah,  what  a  far  cry  from  this  Christian  brother- 
hood service  of  about  the  middle  of  the  second 
century  to  the  elaborate  liturgical  displays,  with 

J/  Apologia,  65-67,  about  year  138-9. 


The  Catholic  Change  155 

priestly  pomp  and  various  pagan  accessories,  of 
later  times.  Even  the  service  in  evangelical 
churches  to-day  is  formality  itself  beside  the  sim- 
ple and  affectionate  frankness  and  reality  of  the 
first  Christian  worship.  But  in  the  worship  of 
the  so-called  Catholic  Churches  (Greek,  Arme- 
nian, Russian,  Roman,  High  AngJic^n^i  <etc.),  we 
are  simply  in  another  world. 


APPENDIX  I 

MoNTANiST  Prophecies 

That  Montanism,  though  purer  than  the  Church,  had  no 
promise  of  a  better  future  may  be  seen  by  the  relatively  small 
religious  and  ethical  value  of  its  prophecies,  which  are  here 
collected  in  English  for  the  first  time,  and  those  from  Epiphanius 
translated  for  the  first  time.  Bonwetsch  has  brought  them  to- 
gether in  the  original  near  the  end  of  his  book  {Geschichte  des 
Montanismus,  Erlangen,  1881,  pp.  197-200). 

Prophecies  of  Montanus 

Man  is  as  a  lyre,  and  I  strike  as  a  plectrum;  man  sleeps,  I 
awake.  See,  the  Lord  is  he  who  removes  [or  deranges,  bewitches, 
e^cardvov]  the  hearts  of  men  and  gives  the  hearts  of  men. — 
Epiphanius,  Haer.  48.  4,  4,  p.  430  Dindorf. 

What  declarest  thou  respecting  the  man  that  is  saved?  The 
just  one  shaU  shine  a  hundred  times  as  much  as  the  sun,  and  the 
little  ones  among  you  who  are  saved  shall  shine  a  hundred 
times  as  much  as  the  moon. — 48.  10,  p.  437. 

Moreover,  Montanus  spoke  thus  to  the  prophets:  I  the  Lord 
the  God  the  Almighty  am  residing  in  man. — 48.  11,  p.  437. 

Then  Montanus  spoke  again  that  neither  an  angel  nor  ambas- 
sador [or  elder]  but  I  the  Lord  God  the  Father  have  come. — 
48.  11,  p.  439. 

For  Montanus,  it  is  declared,  said:  I  am  the  Father  and  the 
Son  and  the  Paraclete.— Didymus,  De  Trin.  41. 1  (Migne  39.  984). 

[Montanus  from  those  songs:  Christ  has  one  nature  and  energy 
before  the  flesh  and  in  the  flesh,  so  that  he  was  not  unlike  by  the 
difference  and  unhkeness  of  deeds.  Nova  Collectio  vii.  p.  69  in 
Patrum  Dodrina  de  Verbi  Incarnatione.  Bonwetsch  says  that 
this  cannot  be  a  real  word  of  Montanus.] 

Prophecies  op  Prisca 
Concerning  these  the  Paraclete  speaks  excellently  through 
the  prophet  Prisca:  They  are  carnal  and  yet  they  hate  the  flesh. 
— Tertullian,  De  Resur.  Carnis  11. 

156 


Appendix  I  157 

The  gospel  is  thus  preached  through  the  holy  prophetess 
Prisca,  and  that  the  holy  minister  should  know  how  to  minister 
holiness.  For  purity,  she  says,  is  harmonious  [concordat],  and 
they  see  visions,  and,  placing  their  face  downward,  they  even 
hear  manifest  voices  as  salutary  as  they  are  also  secret. — Ter- 
tuUian,  De  Exhort.  Cast.  10. 

For  those  among  the  Phrygians  said,  the  Priscilhans  in  Pepuza 
or  Kointilla  or  Priscilla — to  have  lain  down  to  sleep,  and  Christ 
to  have  come,  and  to  have  slept  together  with  her  in  that  way, 
as  she  the  dishonored  said:  Christ  as  in  a  figure  in  the  form  of 
a  woman  came  before  me  in  a  shining  garment  and  threw 
[kvefialEv]  wisdom  in  me,  and  revealed  to  me  there  the  holy 
place  and  thus  the  Jerusalem  to  come  down  from  heaven. — 
Epiphanius,  Haer.  49.  1,  p.  444  Dindorf. 

Prophecies  op  Maximilla 

Straightway  Maximilla  said:  Of  me  you  shall  not  hear,  but 
of  Christ  you  shall  hear.— 48.  12,  p.  439. 

And  Maximilla  said  again,  Of  this  pain  [or  toil,  novov\  cov- 
enant and  promise  the  Lord  sent  me  a  partisan,  an  informer 
[or  guide],  and  interpreter,  having  forced  me  wiUing  or  un- 
willing to  learn  the  knowledge  of  God. — 48.  13,  p.  441. 

And  let  it  not  be  said  in  that  same  word  of  Asterius  Urbanus 
[probably  Montanist  writer]  through  Maximilla:  I  am  driven 
away  as  a  wolf  from  the  sheep.  I  am  not  a  wolf.  I  am  word 
and  spirit  and  power.— Eusebius,  H.  E.  5.  16,  17. 

For  the  narrator  among  them  tells  that  Maximilla  the  prophet 
said:  After  me  there  shall  be  a  prophetess  no  more,  but  the  end 
[consummation,  ^wraem].— Epiphanius,  Haer.  48.  2,  p.  427. 

Eusebius  quotes  a  writer  against  the  Montanists  as  saying 
that  Maximilla  prophesied  of  wars  and  anarchy. — Eusebius, 
H.  E.  5.  17,  18. 

Anonymous  Prophecies 

If  you  ask  counsel  of  the  Spirit,  what  does  he  approve  more 
than  that  utterance  [that  perfect  love  casts  out  fear]?  For 
ahnost  all  are  exhorted  to  martyrdom  not  to  flight  [Bonwetsch, 
p.  198,  says  that  the  reference  is  to  written  expressions  of  the 
Paraclete  which  were  at  hand].    So  that  we  also  make  mention  of 


158  Appendix  I 

it.  If  you  are  exposed  to  the  public,  it  is  good  for  thee;  for  who 
will  not  be  exposed  pubhcly  before  men  will  be  before  the  Lord. 
Do  not  be  ashamed.  Righteousness  brings  you  out  before  all. 
Why  should  you  be  ashamed  of  gaining  glory?  Power  shall 
come  to  you  when  you  are  gazed  at  by  men. — Tertullian,  De 

Fuga  9. 

So  also  elsewhere  [the  Spirit  says  through  a  Montanist  prophet 
or  prophetess]:  Seek  not  to  die  in  beds,  nor  in  miscarriages,  nor 
in  fevers,  but  among  the  martyrs,  that  He  may  be  glorified 
who  has  suffered  for  you.— Z)e  Fuga  9,  at  end  (substantially 
the  same  in  De  Anima  55). 

If  anyone  recognizes  the  Spirit  also  he  will  hear  him  through 
the  Montanist  prophets  branding  the  runaways. — De  Fuga  11. 

I  have  the  Paraclete  himself  speaking  in  the  new  prophets: 
The  Church  has  power  to  forgive  an  offense,  but  I  will  not  do 
it  lest  they  commit  others. — De  Pud.  21 

For  God  sent  forth  the  word,  just  as  the  Paraclete  teaches,  as 
the  root  the  tree,  the  fountain  the  river  and  the  sun  the  ray. — 
Adv.  Prax.  8. 

He  [the  Son]  having  received  from  the  Father  has  shed  forth 
the  gift  [munus],  the  Holy  Spirit,  the  third  name  of  Divinity, 
the  third  degree  of  majesty,  the  preacher  of  the  one  Monarchy, 
but  also  the  interpreter  of  the  economy  [oiKovofiiag],  if  any  one 
receives  the  words  of  his  New  Prophecy,  and  the  leader  into  all 
truth  which  is  in  the  Father  and  Son  and  Holy  Spirit  accord- 
ing to  the  Christian  mystery  [sacramentum],  Adv.  Prax.  30  at 

end. 

(Origen  quotes  Celsus  concerning  certain  prophets  in  Phoe- 
nicia and  Palestine,  and  Ritschl,  Enstehung  d.  altkath.  Kir  die, 
2  Aufl.  490,  beheves  that  they  are  Montanist.  Bonwetsch, 
p.  199,  is  inclined  to  agree  with  him.  Celsus  is  quoted  as  say- 
ing: "There  are  many  who  although  of  no  name,  with  the  great- 
est facility  and  on  the  slightest  occasion,  whether  within  or 
without  temples,  assume  the  motions  and  gestures  of  inspired 
persons;  while  others  do  it  in  cities  or  among  armies  for  attract- 
ing attention  and  exciting  surprise.  These  are  accustomed  to 
say  each  for  himself,  'I  am  God,  or,  the  Son  of  God,  or,  the 
Divine  Spirit.  I  have  come,  for  the  world  is  perishing,  and 
you,  O  men,  are  perishing  for  your  unrighteousness.     But  I 


Appendix  I  I59 

wish  to  save  you,  and  you  ehaU  see  me  returning  again  with 
heavenly  power.  Blessed  is  he  who  does  me  homage  [dpr/aKivaa^] 
On  aU  the  rest  I  wiU  send  down  eternal  fire,  both  on  cities  and 
countries.  And  men  who  know  not  their  punishments  shaU 
repent  and  grieve  in  vain;  while  those  faithful  to  me  I  shall 
preserve  forever.'  "  Then  Celsus  adds:  "To  these  threatenings 
are  added  strange  fanatical  and  quite  uninteUigible  words  of 
which  no  rational  person  can  find  the  meaning,  for  they  are 
darkness  itself."  Origen,  Cont.  Ceh.  7.  9.  I  think  it  rather 
doubtful  whether  these  people  are  Montanists.) 


APPENDIX  II 

Literature 

For  those  who  wish  to  carry  on  further  studies  a  brief  list 
of  modern  books  is  here  presented.  For  larger  lists,  as  well  as 
statement  of  sources,  see  (besides  the  sources  and  books  referred 
to  in  text  and  notes  above)  the  Church  histories,  histories  of 
doctrine,  and  encyclopaedia  articles.  It  goes  without  saying 
that  I  do  not  stand  sponsor  for  the  views  of  all  the  authorities 
referred  to  below.  The  student  of  history  must  keep  an  inde- 
pendent mind,  and  care  for  neither  the  so-called  conservative 
nor  the  so-called  liberal,  but  take  for  his  motto  the  title  of  the 
last  book  of  the  celebrated  Canadian  publicist,  the  late  Goldwin 
Smith,  No  Refuge  but  in  Truth.  He  will  sometimes  find  that 
the  interest  and  stimulus  of  a  book  is  in  inverse  proportion  to 
its  truth,  and  sometimes  that  the  trouble  with  a  wrong  view 
is  not  its  falsity  but  its  exaggeration.  Unperturbed  by  new 
views  or  old  views,  he  should  sit  quietly  before  his  problem  to 
find  out  the  facts  alone. 

Chapters  I  and  II 

On  the  Jewish-Christian  struggle,  consult: 
Fisher,  G.  P.,  The  Beginnings  of  Christianity,  New  York,  1877, 

pp.  469-505. 
Reuss,  E.,  History  of  Christian  Theology  in  the  Apostolic  Age,  tr., 

London,  1872,  vol.  i,  pp.  255-315. 
Weizsacker,  C.  v.,  The  Apostolic  Age,  tr.,  London  and  New  York, 

1805,  vol.  ii,  pp.  1-31,  339-352,  395-397. 
McGiffert,  A.  C,  History  of  Christianity  in  the  Apostolic  Age, 

New  York  and  Edinburgh,  1897,  pp.  81-93,  192-234. 
Wemle,  P.,  Beginnings  of  Christianity,  tr.,   London  and  New 

York,  1904,  vol.  ii,  pp.  25-103. 
Ropes,  J.  H.,  The  Apostolic  Age,  New  York,  1906,  pp.  65-98. 
Workman,  H.  B.,  Christian  Thought  to  the  Reformation,  London 

and  New  York,  1911,  chap.  i.     And  especially: 
Hoennicke,   G.,   Juden^hristenium  im  1   and  2  Jahrhunderten, 

Leipzig,  1908, 

160 


Appendix  II  161 

Schmidtke,   A.,   Fragmente  und   UntersuLchungen  zu  den  juden- 

christlichen  Evangelien:  ein  Beitrag  zur  Literatur  und  Ge- 

schichte  der  Jicdenchristen,  Leipzig,  1911. 
On  the  question  of  the  authenticity  of  Matt.  28.  19,  see: 
Conybeare,  F.  C,  in  the  Zeitschrift  fur  neuetestamentliche  Wis- 

senschaft  und  die  Kunde  des  Urchristentums,  1901,  Heft  4, 

pp.  275-288;  and  especially: 
Riggenbach,  Eduard,  Der  Trinitarische  Taufbefehl  ML   28.   19 

nach  seiner  urspriinglicher  Textgestalt  und  seiner  Authentie 

untersucht,  Gtitersloh,  1903. 
Riggenbach  shows  that  the  alleged  quotations  of  a  shorter 
form  from  Eusebius  are  not  literal  quotations,  but  free  repro- 
ductions, that  when  he  does  quote  he  gives  the  text  as  we  have 
it,  that  he  did  not  change  his  attitude  in  this  regard  after  A.  D. 
325,  that  there  is  no  trace  of  any  MS.  tradition  of  any  other 
Eusebian  text,  and  that  such  a  shorter  form  cannot  be  found 
before  Eusebius.  He  also  makes  the  point  that  when  we  read 
in  the  New  Testament  of  baptism  in  the  name  of  Christ  we  have 
before  us  no  precise  formula.  As  to  such  formulas  people  were 
in  those  days  somewhat  careless.  For  example:  the  Apostles' 
Creed  and  the  Lord's  Prayer.  See  Haussleiter,  Untersuchungen 
zur  Vorgeschichte  des  apostolischen  Glaubensbekenntnisses,  Miin- 
chen,  1893.  This  is  the  alternative  Riggenbach  draws  from  the 
primitive  practice  of  baptism  in  the  name  of  Christ.  Either  the 
first  evangelist  has  himself  invented  the  Trinitarian  form  of 
Matt.  28.  19,  though  they  baptized  then  in  the  name  of  Christ, 
because  he  thought  he  could  best  thus  express  the  meaning  of 
Christ,  or  the  first  Church  did  not  look  upon  the  Trinitarian 
baptism-command  of  Christ  as  a  distinct  formula,  nor  con- 
sidered baptism  in  the  name  of  Christ  a  deviation  from  it.  Rig- 
genbach decides  for  the  second  horn  of  this  dilemma,  and  be- 
lieves that  the  practice  of  baptism  in  the  name  of  Christ  in 
apostolic  times  was  an  instance  of  Christian  liberty. 


Chapter  III 

For  Grosticism,  see  as  above: 
McGififert,  pp.  502-505;  Wemle,  pp.  170-204;  Workman,  pp. 
32-39. 


162  Appendix  II 

Lightfool^  J.   B.,  Epistle  to  the  Colossians,   1875,  8th  edition, 

1886,  pp.  71-111. 
Bigg,  C,  The  Origins  of  Christianity,  Oxford,  1909,  pp.  129-147; 

and  the  following: 
Mansel,  H.  L.,  The  Gnostic  Heresies,  London,  1875. 
Mead,  G.  R.  S.,  Fragments  of  a  Faith  Forgotten,  London,  1900. 
Bischoff,  E.,  Im  Reiche  der  Gnosis,  Leipzig,  1906. 
Bousset,  W.,  Hauptprohleme  der  Gnosis,  Gottingen,  1907. 
Kohler,  W.,   Die  Gnosis,   Tubingen,   1911.     See  literature  on 

p.  60  of  this. 

Chapter  IV 

The  first  important  monograph  on  the  interesting  Montanist 
movement  was  by  Albert  Schwegler,  the  brilliant  young  dis- 
ciple of  Baur,  and  after  him  the  chief  representative  of  the 
Tubingen  school,  which  cut  such  a  wide  swath  in  its  day.  In 
1841,  at  the  age  of  22,  he  brought  out  his  Der  Montanismus  und  die 
christliche  Kirche  des  zweiten  Jahrhunderts,  a  miracle  of  historical 
power  and  learning  for  so  young  a  man.  He  made  the  central 
principle  of  Montanism  the  doctrine  of  the  Paraclete,  and  the 
new  supernatural  epoch  of  revelation  founded  in  and  by  him. 
There  are  three  such  epochs — the  Old  Testament  by  the  Father, 
the  New  Testament  by  the  Logos,  and  the  later  by  the  Para- 
clete. The  latter  founds  the  Church  of  the  Spirit,  all  of  whose 
members  are  priests,  who  mortify  the  flesh  and  reject  the  im- 
worthy.  This  brings  the  end  and  the  millennium.  Between 
the  Spirit  and  the  Logos  there  is  a  hypostatic  difference,  and  in 
this  movement,  says  Schwegler,  is  where  you  will  find  the  origin 
of  the  fourth  Gospel  and  the  Church  doctrine  of  the  Trinity. 
Historically,  Montanism  is  a  branch  of  Ebionite  Jewish  Chris- 
tianity, to  which  also  the  pseudo-clementine  Homihes  belong. 
In  these  Homihes,  says  our  young  scholar,  you  get  the  principle 
of  the  whole  Montanist  movement,  namely,  that  every  revela- 
tion of  rehgious  truth  is  prophecy.  Its  ascetism  and  its  chiliasm 
are  also  evidences  of  its  Jewish  origin,  and  when  the  Catholic 
Church  condemned  it  she  condemned  also  her  own  Jewish 
Christian  past,  because  it  "represented  the  general  dogmatic 
consciousness  of  the  middle  of  the  second  century." 

The  theological  faculty  of  the  University  of  Berhn  gave  a  prize 
to  a  student  of  chemistry,  Waldemar  Belck,  for  an  investigation 


Appendix  II  163 

of  Montanism  which  he  pubHshed:  Geschichte  des  Montanismus, 
Leipzig,  1883.  Belck  holds  that  Montanism  was  not  a  reaction 
toward  primitive  Christianity,  but  an  advance  upon  it.  This 
advance  consisted  in  emphasizing  universal  prophecy  instead 
of  the  universal  priesthood  of  the  early  Church,  in  emphasizing 
moral  disciphne  toward  a  complete  separation  from  the  world, 
in  a  supernaturahsm  which  looked  upon  God  himself  as  the 
leader  in  every  Church  matter,  and  in  making  the  Spirit  the 
first  member  of  the  Trinity,  thus  creating  a  subordination 
Trinity,  but  in  inverse  order.  It  is  hardly  necessary  to  say 
that  both  Schwegler  and  Belck  are  partly  true  and  partly  false. 
Both  Montanism  and  the  Catholic  Church  were  an  advance, 
but  in  different  ways:  the  former,  looking  for  the  near  end  of 
all  things,  narrowed  the  boundaries  of  the  Church  more  and 
more;  the  latter,  conscious  of  a  world  task,  broadened  them. 

Over  against  these  one-sided  books,  Ritschl  broke  the  path 
for  a  true  view  of  Montanism  in  his  Die  Entsiehung  der  altkatho- 
lischen  Kirche,  Bonn,  2  Aufl.,  1857,  pp.  462-554,  and  Bonwetsch 
put  the  chmax  in  his  great  monograph  Die  Geschichte  des  Mon- 
tanismus, Erlangen,  1881.  See  also  the  Histories  of  Doctrine 
by  Seeberg  and  Harnack.  An  Anghcan  scholar,  John  de  Soyres, 
did  an  excellent  piece  of  work  in  his  Montanism  and  the  Primi- 
tive Church,  Cambridge,  1878. 

Chapter  V 

Besides  the  authorities  cited  in  the  text,  see  the  histories  of 
doctrine  and  of  the  Church. 

Chapter  VI 
On  Chiliasm,  see: 

Peters,  George  H.  N.,  The  Theocratic  Kingdom,  New  York,  1884, 

vol.  i,  pp.  449ff. 
Atzberger,  L.,  Geschichte  der  christUchen  Eschatologie,  Freiburg, 
1896. 

Chapter  VII 
On  Arianism,  see: 

Workman,  H.  B.,  Christian  Thought  to  the  Reformation,  London 

and  New  York,  1911,  pp.  62-83. 
Rainy,  R.,  The  Ancient  Catholic  Church,  London  and  New  York, 

1902,  pp.  323-357. 


164  Appendix  II 

Bright,  W.,  Age  of  the  Fathers,  London,  1903,  pp.  53-246.  And 
the  following  special  works: 

Kolling,  W.,  Geschichte  der  arianischen  Hdresie  his  zur  Entschei' 
dung  in  Nicaea,  2  vols.,  Gtitersloh,  1874,  1883. 

Gwatkin,  H.  M.,  Studies  in  Arianism,  London,  1882;  new  edi- 
tion, 1900. 

Gwatkin,  H.  M.,  The  Arian  Controversy,  London  and  New  York, 
1891. 

Snellmann,  P.,  Anfdng  des  arianischen  Streites,  Helsingfors, 
1904. 

Rogala,  S.,  Die  Anfdnge  des  arianischen  Streites  untersucht, 
Paderborn,  1907. 

Chapter  VIII 

Besides  the  Church  histories  and  histories  of  doctrine,  see: 
Wernle,  P.,  The  Beginnings  of  Christianity,  London  and  New 

York,  vol.  ii,  pp.  297-363. 
Means,  S.,  St.  Paul  and  the  Ante-Nicene  Church,  London,  1903, 

chaps,  iii  and  v. 
Fairbairn,  A.  M.,  Studies  in  Religion  and  Theology,  London  and 

New  York,  1910,  pp.  176-204. 


INDEX 

PAGB 

Alexander,  bishop  of  Alexandria,  views  on  Christ 124 

Alogi,  views   on  Christ 84 

Ancient   Homily  ="2   Clem.,"  view  on   Christ's;    second 

coming 107 

Arian  movement  discussed 113 

Arius,  views  on  Christ 121 

Asia  Minor,  center  of  Christian  movements 60 

Athanasius,  points  on  Divinity  of  Christ 129 

Augustine  largely  destroyed  Chiliasm 112 

Baptism  a  regeneration 147 

Christ's  command  to  baptize 11, 160 

Bar-Kochba,   influence   of   rebellion    of  on   Judaism    and 

Christianity 23 

Barnabas,  epistle  of,  on  Judaism 28 

An  allegorizer 35 

On  Christ's  second  coming 106 

Callistus,  bishop  ot  Rome,  mistaken  views  on  Christ 91 

Cerinthus,  views  of 30 

Chiliasm  discussed 97 

Clementines,  the  so-called 32 

Commission,  the  Great  (Matt.  28.  19):  is  it  authentic?.  11,  160 

Council,  the  first  (Acts  15) 17 

Prohibitions  of:  are  they  authentic? 18 

The  first  regular  Ecumenical 125 

Creeds,  Gnostic  influence  on  rise  of 46 

Are  the  germs  of  creeds  in  New  Testament? 148 

Ecstasy,  utterance  in 54,  59 

Elkesaites 31 

Episcopate,  growth  of 59,  89,  149,  150 

Eusebius  of  Caesarea,  his  creed 132 

His  reasons  for  accepting  the  Nicene  Creed 136 

Gnosticism  discussed 34 

Was  it  a  Hellenizing  of  the  Gospel? 41 

Ignatius  on  Jews  and  Jewish  Christianity 27 

Irenaeus,  views  of,  on  Christ's  second  coming  and  kingdom .  108 

James,  brother  of  Jesus,  fate  of .  -'  . .  .i. .-.  .i:\'J  .i*.', .  i  ..»•.. .  24 

Jesus  Christ,  his  attitude, on;  Judaism.  ♦ .'. .'.«.  ?.''•.  *.  ♦*...*. . .  9 

Gnostic  view  of '....'..'..'.'...'..'..'.'.!..'.  .*. .  .*  39,  51 

Early  Christian  views  .of. ......  .^  ,,. .., , , ... ... .  76 

Was  he  a  Chiliaat?  .  . .  -  •, .:.;  .',  ..*. .:,, .-,/..  .*.,:  ;..:..;;..  103 

Was  he  divine?. . .  , ,. ;  .*.:.: . :; . .: ; .',  :„J!.4. .:...;...  113 

165 

.  »   »•  »    ,•  <        •  ,    ,•  •    4 

'•  •••'  •»-•  •(!  • 


166  Index 

PAGE 

Judaism,  Christ's  attitude  toward 9 

Can  Jewish  Christians  be  saved?. 26 

Chiliastic  views  of  later • . ; 100 

Justin  Martyr,  on  whether  Jews  and  Jewish  Christians  can 

be  saved 26 

Allegorizes  Old  Testament 35 

Views  on  Christ's  second  coming  and  kingdom 109 

Christian  worship  in  his  time 154 

Life,  the  Christian,  Gnostic  influence  on 40 

Second  coming  of  Christ,  influence  on 56,  66,  70 

Catholic  view  of 146 

Marcion,  views  of 43 

Marriage,  Montanist  view  of 66 

Ministers  as  priests 1^1 

Monarchianism  discussed 76 

Montanism  discussed ,•.••••,' 5? 

Indorsed  by  bishop  of  Rome  and  later  repudiated 89 

Text  of  Montanist  prophecies 156 

Schwegler's  views  of 161 

Belck's  views  of .••••. •  162 

New  Testament,  Gnostic  influence  on  determmation  of 

books  of 4^ 

Nicaea,  council  of lj;5 

Creed  of ■'^"* 

Reasons  for  final  acceptance  of  Creed  of qq^qk 

Noetus,  views  on  Christ 'i?a 

Origen,  views  on  Chihasm JJO 

On  Christ 117 

Parseeism,  mother  of  Chihasm 100 

Paul  of  Samosata,  his  views  on  Christ 1^ 

Penitents,  receiving  again  in  Church 69 

New  (Catholic)  view  of  penitence 140 

Peter,  the  Gospel  of 47 

Philo,  his  allegoric  method ., gg 

Popes  of  Rome,  mistaken  views  on  Christ oo 

See  Callistus.  _ 

Praxeas,  views  on  Christ ;a  '  ;.o  *  Vo  i'>4X '  i  ko  i  kq 

Prophecy,  early  Christian 52,  63,  72, 149, 152, 153 

Revelation,  Book  of,  feeUng  of  Greek  Church  toward Ill 

Sabellius,  views  on  Christ ^ 

Saved,  the  classes  of  (Gnosticism) .•••.•  •  •     f^ 

Second  coming  of  Christ  near 55,  bO,  bJ,  b& 

Chiliastic  view  of ^ 

Tatian,  hie  Gospel  Harmony ••••••••• to 

Teaching  o^  twelve  apostles  (Didacue)  on  Prophets ^^ 

On  Christ's  second  coming •   106 

Theodotus  of  Byzantium,  views  on  Christ 'i  co 

Worship-,  early  Gbristi&n  not  Catholu- 15^5 


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